About

Sabine Kastner is a Professor affiliated with the Princeton Neuroscience Institute at Princeton University. Her research program aims to better understand how large-scale networks operate during cognition, with a focus on the visual attention network as a model system. Her work investigates how these networks establish efficient communication and the neural coding used in different network nodes to drive behavior. She studies these processes in two primate brain models, the human and the macaque monkey, employing an integrated approach that combines invasive electrophysiology—such as Electrocorticography in human epilepsy patients and simultaneous multi-site recordings in monkeys—with various brain imaging modalities including functional magnetic resonance imaging and diffusion tensor imaging. Her research also explores the neural basis of attentional selection from natural scenes, the functional parcellation of the human parietal cortex, the topographic organization of the human visual system, and the neural mechanisms underlying object perception, including studies with patients suffering from object agnosia and amnesia. Kastner has received numerous accolades for her contributions to cognitive neuroscience, including the Warren Medal by the Society of Experimental Psychologists, the Golden Brain Award, the George A. Miller Prize from the Cognitive Neuroscience Society, and election to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.

Research topics

• Psychology
• Political Science
• Neuroscience
• Social Science
• Sociology
• Gender studies
• Business
• Cognitive science
• Evolutionary biology
• Mathematics
• Social psychology
• Public relations
• Biology

Selected publications

• Closed-loop stimulation modulates attention shifting in children

  Nature Neuroscience · 2026-05-13

  article
  PublisherDOI

• Takeaways from the First Year of Open Peer Review at<i>JNeurosci</i>

  Journal of Neuroscience · 2025-04-09 · 1 citations

  articleOpen accessSenior author

  launched an open peer review (OPR) initiative in late 2023 to enhance transparency and accountability in scientific publishing. Analysis of 740 manuscripts and 1,490 reviews revealed that 81.4% of authors opted to share rebuttal letters, with increasing participation over time (67.6% in Dec 2023 to 94.4% in Aug 2024). Reviewer participation was lower (66.8%) but stable, with higher opt-in rates for longer, higher-quality reviews. Geographical analysis of author and reviewer institutions showed that authors from North American and European institutions had greater OPR opt-in rates, authors from Asian institutions had lower opt-in rates, and reviewers from North American institutions had lower opt-in rates compared with the average rates across regions. Further, analysis of manuscript subdiscipline showed it to be predictive of OPR opt-in rates, e.g., authors of manuscripts in cellular or molecular neuroscience were less likely to opt-in compared with the average across subdisciplines. Overall, OPR acceptance is growing, reflecting a positive shift toward open science.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Author-Centered Approach to Scientific Publishing

  Journal of Neuroscience · 2025-02-19

  editorialOpen access1st authorCorresponding
  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Human attention-guided visual perception is governed by rhythmic oscillations and aperiodic timescales

  PLoS Biology · 2025-06-27 · 6 citations

  articleOpen accessCorresponding

  Attention samples visual space sequentially to enhance behaviorally relevant sensory representations. While traditionally conceptualized as a static continuous spotlight, contemporary models of attention highlight its discrete nature. But which neural mechanisms govern the temporally precise allocation of attention? Periodic brain activity as exemplified by neuronal oscillations as well as aperiodic temporal structure in the form of intrinsic neural timescales have been proposed to orchestrate the attentional sampling process in space and time. However, both mechanisms have been largely studied in isolation. To date, it remains unclear whether periodic and aperiodic temporal structure reflect distinct neural mechanisms. Here, we combined computational simulations with a multimodal approach encompassing five experiments, and three different variants of classic spatial attention paradigms, to differentiate aperiodic from oscillatory-based sampling. Converging evidence across behavior as well as scalp and intracranial electroencephalography (EEG) revealed that periodic and aperiodic temporal regularities can theoretically and experimentally be distinguished. Our results extend the rhythmic sampling framework of attention by demonstrating that aperiodic neural timescales predict behavior in a spatially-, context-, and demand-dependent manner. Aperiodic timescales increased from sensory to association cortex, decreased during sensory processing or action execution, and were prolonged with increasing behavioral demands. These results reveal that multiple, concurrent temporal regularities govern attentional sampling.

  PublisherDOI

• Expansion of a conserved architecture drives the evolution of the primate visual cortex

  Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences · 2025-01-13 · 12 citations

  articleOpen access

  Human brain evolution is marked by a disproportionate expansion of cortical regions associated with advanced perceptual and cognitive functions. While this expansion is often attributed to the emergence of novel specialized brain areas, modifications to evolutionarily conserved cortical regions also have been linked to species-specific behaviors. Distinguishing between these two evolutionary outcomes has been limited by the ability to make direct comparisons between species. Here, we addressed this limitation by examining the expansion of the human visual cortex relative to macaques using a common functional architecture: retinotopy. Our findings revealed that human visual cortex expansion is primarily driven by increases in the surface area of a visual map architecture present in macaques rather than an increase in the number of individual areas. This expansion was not uniform, with higher-order areas, particularly in the parietal cortex, exhibiting the largest growth. Comparisons between neonate and adult humans revealed that these relative areal size differences were already established at birth. A meta-analysis of neuroimaging studies indicated that the most expanded areas are associated with advanced cognitive functions beyond visual processing. These results suggest that human perceptual and cognitive adaptations may be rooted in the expansion of evolutionarily conserved cortical architecture, with modifications even in the sensory cortex contributing to the broader cognitive functions characteristic of human behavior.

  PublisherDOI

• High-frequency bursts facilitate fast communication for human spatial attention

  Nature Neuroscience · 2025-12-02

  articleOpen accessSenior author
  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Causal role for pulvinar burst firing in thalamo-cortical attention control

  bioRxiv (Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory) · 2025-09-17 · 2 citations

  preprintOpen accessSenior authorCorresponding

  The primate pulvinar has been implicated in coordinating cortical networks during attention, but its causal role remains elusive. Like other thalamic nuclei, pulvinar neurons switch between tonic and burst firing, but whether bursts influence behavior and cognitive processes is unknown. Here, we show that pulvinar bursts are not only modulated by attention but also predict behavioral performance. In macaques performing a covert attention task, bursts were more frequent for non-cued targets and uniquely reconfigured population codes in parietal cortex. Crucially, electrical microstimulation of pulvinar triggered bursts that enhanced target detection and synchronized cortical spiking, with behavioral benefits scaling with the strength of burst recruitment. These results establish pulvinar bursts as a causal driver of attention, revealing a thalamo-cortical mechanism by which thalamus exerts moment-to-moment control over cortical processing and behavior.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• KIASORT: Knowledge-Integrated Automated Spike Sorting for Geometry-Free Neuron Tracking

  bioRxiv (Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory) · 2025-07-16

  preprintOpen accessSenior author

  Modern high-density neural recordings demand spike sorting algorithms that can handle diverse probe geometries and complex, neuron-specific drift, yet existing methods often rely on rigid geometric assumptions and one-dimensional drift models. Here, we introduce KIASORT (Knowledge-Integrated Automated Spike Sorting), a geometry-free approach for per-neuron drift tracking. KIASORT trains channel-specific classifiers in a hybrid linear-nonlinear embedding space, capturing waveform features often missed by conventional linear methods. These classifiers then sort spikes by independently tracking each neuron, unconstrained by probe layout. Biophysical simulations showed that even sub-micron probe displacements induce neuron-specific waveform distortions that standard drift models cannot correct. In ground-truth benchmarks with heterogeneous, neuron-specific drift, KIASORT significantly outperformed Kilosort4 in recovering high-quality units, while maintaining real-time performance on standard CPUs. Its robustness was further validated on both primate and mouse data. KIASORT combines automated sorting with manual curation in a unified graphical interface, offering a complete and user-friendly spike sorting platform. The software is freely available at https://kiasort.com.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Separating rhythms of sensory and motor preparation

  Journal of Vision · 2024-09-15

  articleOpen access

  Covert attention enhances the processing of relevant stimuli within our environment without the need for overt eye movements. Recent work has demonstrated that our covert attentional system rhythmically samples the environment approximately 3 to 8 times per second. Our sensory system must work in tandem with our motor system to produce fluent natural behaviour. That is, once we perceive a task-relevant stimulus, we must execute the appropriate response. Although past work has shown an important role for actions in resetting perceptual sampling, it remains unclear to what extent motor preparation is itself rhythmically modulated. To investigate whether motor preparation follows a similar rhythmic sampling as found in perception, we designed a task that orthogonalized sensory and motor preparation. Compound cues indicated both the most likely location of an upcoming target stimulus (left or right visual field) and the most likely motor response (left or right button press). Both sensory and motor predictions of cues were valid in a majority of trials. However, in a minority of trials, predictions could be invalid in only the sensory domain, only the motor domain, or both domains with equal likelihood. The interval between the cue and target varied between 300 and 1100 ms. This manipulation allowed us to interrogate the effects of valid sensory vs. motor cues orthogonally time. Consistent with previous work we found that sensory cues modulated behaviour in a range between 3 and 8 Hz. In contrast, interestingly, motor preparation showed little evidence of rhythmic modulation.

  PublisherDOI

• Brain Charts for the Rhesus Macaque Lifespan

  bioRxiv (Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory) · 2024-08-30 · 9 citations

  preprintOpen access

  Recent efforts to chart human brain growth across the lifespan using large-scale MRI data have provided reference standards for human brain development. However, similar models for nonhuman primate (NHP) growth are lacking. The rhesus macaque, a widely used NHP in translational neuroscience due to its similarities in brain anatomy, phylogenetics, cognitive, and social behaviors to humans, serves as an ideal NHP model. This study aimed to create normative growth charts for brain structure across the macaque lifespan, enhancing our understanding of neurodevelopment and aging, and facilitating cross-species translational research. Leveraging data from the PRIMatE Data Exchange (PRIME-DE) and other sources, we aggregated 1,522 MRI scans from 1,024 rhesus macaques. We mapped non-linear developmental trajectories for global and regional brain structural changes in volume, cortical thickness, and surface area over the lifespan. Our findings provided normative charts with centile scores for macaque brain structures and revealed key developmental milestones from prenatal stages to aging, highlighting both species-specific and comparable brain maturation patterns between macaques and humans. The charts offer a valuable resource for future NHP studies, particularly those with small sample sizes. Furthermore, the interactive open resource (https://interspeciesmap.childmind.org) supports cross-species comparisons to advance translational neuroscience research.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

Recent grants

• Neural mechanisms of attention

  NIH · $5.2M · 2001–2023

• NIH Grant R21EY021078

  NIH · $435k · 2013

• Meso-microscale physiology and dynamics of slow network fluctuations

  NIH · $45.7M · 2017–2028

• Attentional selection from natural scenes

  NSF · $529k · 2013–2017

• Neural basis of visual attention in the primate brain

  NIH · $1.4M · 2024–2029

Frequent coauthors

• Mark A. Pinsk

  Princeton University

  49 shared

• Steven M. Silverstein

  University of Rochester Medical Center

  32 shared

• Michael Arcaro

  California University of Pennsylvania

  31 shared

• Brian P. Keane

  University of Rochester Medical Center

  25 shared

• Ian C. Fiebelkorn

  University of Rochester

  24 shared

• Danielle Paterno

  Rutgers Sexual and Reproductive Health and Rights

  23 shared

• Leslie G. Ungerleider

  22 shared

• Yuri B. Saalmann

  University of Wisconsin–Madison

  20 shared

Labs

• Neuroscience of Attention & Perception LaboratoryPI

Education

• Ph.D.

  Georg-August-Universität Göttingen

  1994

• M.D.

  Heinrich-Heine-Universität Düsseldorf

  1993

• B.A., History & Philosophy

  Georg-August-Universität Göttingen

  1986

Awards & honors

• Sabine Kastner awarded Warren Medal by Society of Experiment…
• Sabine Kastner to receive the 2024 Golden Brain Award
• Sabine Kastner named as the 2023 recipient of the Cognitive…
• Cohen and Kastner elected to American Academy of Arts and Sc…
• Sabine Kastner receives Award for Education in Neuroscience