Jose-Manuel Alonso, PhD

Distinguished Professor
Biological and Vision Sciences
https://www.alonsolab.org/
  • General
  • Credentials
  • Scholarship

Bio

Dr. Alonso is a Distinguished Professor at the State University of New York (SUNY) College of Optometry. He is a visual neuroscientist whose research investigates how neural circuits transform light signals entering the eye into meaningful visual perception. His work focuses on the functional organization of the retina, thalamus, and primary visual cortex, with particular emphasis on how ON and OFF pathways encode increments and decrements of light and contribute to the formation of visual representations in the brain. Using a combination of electrophysiology, computational analysis, and systems neuroscience approaches, his laboratory has identified fundamental mechanisms that shape spatial resolution, contrast sensitivity, and the development of cortical maps. These studies have advanced understanding of thalamocortical processing and revealed key principles governing how visual information is transmitted, integrated, and interpreted across multiple stages of the visual system. Dr. Alonso's research has also provided important insights into the neural mechanisms that regulate ocular growth and refractive development, including how imbalances between ON and OFF visual pathways may contribute to the development of myopia. He also mentors graduate students and trainees in vision science and neuroscience at SUNY Optometry. Dr. Alonso was appointed SUNY Distinguished Professor, one of the highest academic honors within the State University of New York system, in recognition of his sustained record of influential scholarship and leadership in visual neuroscience. His research has been widely published in leading scientific journals and has helped shape contemporary understanding of cortical and thalamic visual processing. His work has also been profiled on radio, television, and online media outlets in the United States and internationally. Dr. Alonso earned his MD and MS from the University of Santiago de Compostela in Spain, followed by a PhD in Neuroscience from the Universidad Autónoma de Madrid. He completed postdoctoral training at The Rockefeller University under Nobel Laureate Torsten N. Wiesel, where he studied the organization and function of visual cortical circuits.

Education

  • PhD, , University Autonoma of Madrid, 1992
  • MD, , University of Santiago, 1989
  • MS, , University of Santiago, 1989

Publications

  • Functional implications of orientation maps in primary visual cortex., Nature communications 7 13529 13529, 2016
  • Neuronal and perceptual differences in the temporal processing of darks and lights., Neuron 82 (1): 224-34 224-34, 2014
  • Neuronal nonlinearity explains greater visual spatial resolution for darks than lights., Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America 111 (8): 3170-5 3170-5, 2014

Presentations

  • Uncorrected Visual Acuity Showed More OFF-Pathway Deficit in Myopic Children, 2023
    Poster
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