Brian L Frost, PhD

Hello! I'm Brian Lance Frost, a postdoctoral scientist in the Gadagkar Lab at Columbia University's Zuckerman institute. Currently, I am working on discovering correlations between neural firing patterns in the striatum of the zebra finch and the acoustic features of song. Previously, I studied the mechanisms that underly the sense of hearing from theoretical and experimental perspectives. I am also an adjunct professor of mathematics and electrical engineering at the Cooper Union, and have taught courses in the mathematics and physics departments at New York University and Columbia University, respectively. This site hosts posts about my current research, publications and will eventually include my personal projects.

Email: b.frost@columbia.edu
Doctoral Thesis: Available as a PDF.
Curriculum Vitae: Available as a PDF.

Employment Update! Gadagkar Lab - Spring, 2026

As of March, 2026, I am working as a postdoctoral scientist at the Gadagkar Lab! Under the advisement of Vikram Gadagkar, the lab investigates neural mechanisms for the production of song in zebra finches. I will be investigating the relationship between neural firing in the striatum with the acoustic features of the song produced by the bird. Moreover, I've been helping to develop experimental techniques to modulate the firing rate of these neurons during song to facilitate this inquiry.

Pre-Print alert! Hair cell arrangement in the larval zebrafish lateral line - Spring, 2026

Emily Atlas, a recent graduate from the Hudspeth Lab at Rockefeller, has published her pre-print regarding hair cell fate in the development of the zebra fish lateral line organ. My work on this project involved developing the methods to quantify the three-dimensional geometry of hair cell pairs as they rotate and sometimes swap positions. It was fun to work on this project, and an interesting step into a different world than what I'm used to. Read it here! Or download as a PDF.

Rest in Peace A. James Hudspeth - August 20, 2025

After a long battle with brain cancer, Jim Hudspeth died in his home this past Saturday. This news is heartbreaking to everyone in the scientific community, and particularly us here in the Hudspeth lab. Jim was one of the greatest men I ever had the pleasure to interact with, and I feel blessed that I was able to work under him.

He was not only a brilliant man with extensive knowledge of the sciences and arts, but also a compassionate man with a passion for mentoring and educating the people he crossed paths with. It is hard to believe that this man, so much larger than life, is no longer with us in this world.

We love and miss you, Jim!

Appointment Update! NYU Adjuct Instructorship - Fall 2025

I am happy to announce that I will be working at New York University in the coming semester. As an adjunct instructor in the Courant school of mathematics, I will be teaching an undergraduate course in probability theory. This will be in conjunction with my adjunct instructorship at the Cooper Union, where I will be teaching an undergraduate course in vector calculus. I look forward to the coming semester!

Publication Alert! Lineal Motion in the OHC-DC Junction - March 3, 2025

The Hearing Research special edition containing work discussed at Mechanics of Hearing 2025 is out, and our work on 2-D Outer Hair Cell-Deiters Cell junction motion made it in! The paper is primarily about a model, backed by a few 2-D motion recordings made using the method from our 2023 JASA paper, in which the OHCs may drive motion along a straight line rather than a non-degenerate ellipse in the longitudinal-transverse plane. Read it here! Or download as a PDF.

Publication Alert! Multi-Author OCT Review Article - December 4, 2024

A new, large multi-author paper was released yesterday covering various applications of OCT to cochlear micromechanics. Yours truly is an author of section 2.5, "Two issues arising from the uni-directional optical axis, and how to account for them." I am very happy that my work was considered substantial enough to merit inclusion in this publication! Read it here! Or download as a PDF.

New Site Launch - October 1, 2024

I've moved my site over from one hosted on Wix, a website-building and hosting platform, to one (very obviously) created by myself. The 1990s web vibe is an aesthetic choice, I promise! My apologies for the lack of content as I continue to build up the site.