Linden Lab

Research projects

We believe the best science and greatest impact arises from cross-fertilisation of ideas, between people and across disciplines. Our projects are interdisciplinary and involve collaborations with colleagues at UCL and/or around the world. Current research topics include:

• Brain mechanisms of listening
• Auditory brain abnormalities in developmental disorders
• Auditory brain abnormalities in schizophrenia
• Other ongoing work

Find out more about our research.

• Lu C and Linden JF (2023). Auditory evoked-potential abnormalities in a mouse model of 22q11.2 Deletion Syndrome and their interactions with hearing impairment. Translational Psychiatry, 15:4.
• Murtaugh S, Panconesi D, Lu C, Abidoph R, Cotic M, Mills D, Richards-Belle A, Richards-Brown M, Khani NS, Varney L, Linden JF and Bramon B (2025). Hearing problems in humans and mouse models with rare copy number variants associated with schizophrenia: a scoping review protocol. Wellcome Open Research, 9:546.
• Akritas M, Armstrong AG, Lebert JM, Meyer AF, Sahani M and Linden JF (2024). Nonlinear sensitivity to acoustic context is a stable feature of neuronal responses to complex sounds in auditory cortex of awake mice. eLife, doi: 10.7554/eLife.98415.1.
• Wang B, Otten LJ, Schulze K, Afrah H, Varney L, Cotic M, Saadullah Khani N, Linden JF, Kuchenbaecker K, McQuillen A, Hall M-H and Bramon E (2024). Is auditory processing measured by the N100 an endophenotype for psychosis? A family study and a meta-analysis. Psychological Medicine, 54(8):1559-1572.
• Linden JF (2023). Sensory representations in the auditory cortex and thalamus. Chapter 22 in: Usrey WM (Ed.), Sherman CM (Ed.), Hirsch JA (Section Ed.) and King AJ (Section Ed.), The Cerebral Cortex and Thalamus. Oxford Academic Press, pp. 229-238.
• Zinnamon FA, Harrison FG, Wenas S, Liu Q, Wang KH and Linden JF (2023). Increased central auditory gain and decreased parvalbumin-positive cortical interneuron density in the Df1/+ mouse model of schizophrenia correlate with hearing impairment. Biological Psychiatry: Global Open Science, 3:386-397.
• Wang B, Zartaloudi E, Linden JF and Bramon E (2022).  Neurophysiology in psychosis: the quest for biomarkers of disease mechanisms. Translational Psychiatry, 12(1):100.
• Gothner T, Goncalves PJ, Sahani M, Linden JF and Hildebrandt KH (2021). Sustained activation of PV+ interneurons in auditory cortex enables robust divisive gain control for complex and naturalistic stimuli. Cerebral Cortex 31(5):2364-2381.
• Kopp-Scheinpflug C and Linden JF (2020). Coding of Temporal Information. Chapter 2.35 in: Fritzsch B (Ed.) and Grothe B (Volume Ed.), The Senses: A Comprehensive Reference, Volume 2 (Audition). Elsevier, Academic Press, pp. 691-712.
• Meyer AF*, Poort J*, O'Keefe J, Sahani M and Linden JF (2018). A head-mounted camera system integrates detailed behavioral monitoring with multichannel electrophysiology in freely moving mice. Neuron 100:46-60.e7. *equal contributions
• Kopp-Scheinpflug C, Sinclair JL and Linden JF (2018). When sound stops: offset responses in the auditory system. Trends in Neurosciences 41:712-728.
• Anderson LA*, Hesse LL*, Pilati N*, Bakay WMH, Alvaro G, Large CH, McAlpine D, Schaette R, and Linden JF (2018). Increased spontaneous firing rates in auditory midbrain following noise exposure are specifically abolished by a Kv3 channel modulator. Hearing Research 365:77-89. *equal contributions
• Hildebrandt KJ, Sahani M and Linden JF (2017). The impact of cortical state on spike-sorting success: a comparison of ketamine and urethane anaesthesia. Frontiers in Systems Neuroscience, 29 November 2017, doi:10.3389/fncir.2017.00095. 
• Guidi LG, Mattley J, Martinez-Garay I, Monaco AP, Linden JF, Velayos-Baeza A and Molnar Z (2017). Knockout mice for dyslexia susceptibility gene homologs KIAA0319 and KIAA0319L have unaffected neuronal migration but display abnormal auditory processing. Cerebral Cortex 17:1-15.
• Burgess CP, Lak A, Steinmetz N, Zatka-Haas P, Reddy CB, Jacobs E, Linden JF, Paton JJ, Ranson A, Schroeder S, Soares S, Wells M, Wool LE, Harris KD, Carandini M (2017).  High-yield methods for accurate two-alternative visual psychophysics in head-fixed mice. Cell Reports 20(10): 2513-2524.
• Linden JF (2017). Timing is everything: corticothalamic mechanisms for active listening. Neuron 95(1): 3-5.
• Meyer AF, Williamson RS, Linden JF and Sahani M (2017). Models of neuronal stimulus-response functions: elaboration, estimation and evaluation. Frontiers in Systems Neuroscience 10(109), doi: 10.3389/fnsys.2016.00109. 
• Hesse LL, Bakay W, Ong HC, Anderson LA, Ashmore J, McAlpine D, Linden JF and Schaette R (2016). Non-monotonic relation between noise exposure severity and neuronal hyperactivity in the auditory midbrain. Frontiers in Neurology 7(133), doi: 10.3389/fnrur.2016.00133. 
• Williamson RS, Ahrens M, Linden JF* and Sahani M* (2016). Input-specific modulation by local sensory context shapes cortical and thalamic responses to complex sounds. Neuron 91(2): 467-71. *equal contributions
• Anderson LA and Linden JF (2016). Mind the gap: two dissociable mechanisms of temporal processing in the auditory system. Journal of Neuroscience 36(6): 1977-95.

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