Dr. Edvard Moser is a world-renowned neuroscientist whose groundbreaking discoveries have transformed our understanding of spatial navigation in the brain. He currently serves as Professor of Neuroscience and Director of the Kavli Institute for Systems Neuroscience at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology in Trondheim. After initial studies in mathematics and programming at the University of Oslo, he switched his focus to psychology and neurobiology, earning his doctorate in neurophysiology in 1995. His academic journey included postdoctoral research at the University of Edinburgh with Richard Morris and at University College London with John O'Keefe, where he developed the experimental techniques that would later lead to his seminal discoveries. Moser began his faculty position at NTNU in 1996 and rapidly established himself as a leading figure in cognitive neuroscience.
In 2005, Dr. Moser and his collaborator May-Britt Moser made the landmark discovery of grid cells in the entorhinal cortex, neural cells that activate in a hexagonal grid pattern as animals navigate through space, effectively creating a coordinate system for spatial representation. This revolutionary finding provided critical insights into the brain's navigational system, explaining how mammals create cognitive maps of their environment and fundamentally changing neuroscience's understanding of spatial representation. Their work demonstrated how these grid cells interact with place cells discovered earlier by John O'Keefe, creating a comprehensive framework for understanding the brain's positioning system. The discovery has profound implications for understanding neurological disorders including Alzheimer's disease, where spatial navigation deficits are among the earliest symptoms. For these transformative contributions to neuroscience, Dr. Moser shared the 2014 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine with his wife May-Britt Moser and John O'Keefe.
Dr. Moser has established himself as a global leader in neuroscience through his role in founding multiple research centers including the Centre for the Biology of Memory in 2002 and the Kavli Institute for Systems Neuroscience in 2007, fostering collaborative research environments that have trained numerous neuroscientists. His laboratory continues to push the boundaries of neural recording technology, actively developing and implementing innovative tools like Neuropixels probes and 2-photon miniscopes for studying neural activity in freely-moving rodents. Current research focuses on unraveling how space and time emerge from interactions between large numbers of neurons with known functional identity, building upon the foundation of his earlier breakthrough discoveries. As a mentor and scientific leader, Dr. Moser has shaped the careers of countless researchers and continues to drive the field forward with his vision for understanding the neural basis of cognition. His work remains highly influential, inspiring new generations of neuroscientists to explore the complex neural networks underlying memory and spatial representation.
