Liberal Arts and Sciences
Liao Lab
Led by James Liao · Biology
What we study
The Liao Lab studies how fish move and sense their environment, focusing on the biomechanics of swimming and the neural circuits that control behavior. They use laboratory experiments with zebrafish, field observations of wild fish, and computer models of fluid dynamics.
What working here is like
- Wet lab
- Fieldwork
- Computational
- Zebrafish
- Wild animals
- Marine organisms
- Coding helps
- Projects
- 5
- Papers
- 5
Current projects
From Theory to Thrust: Revealing the Role of Actuation and Sensing in How Undulatory Swimmers Change Speed
Investigates how actuation and sensing affect speed changes in undulatory swimmers using theory and experiments.
Environmental controlled recirculating seawater system for advanced marine science experimentation
Develops a recirculating seawater system to enable controlled marine laboratory experiments.
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Schooling through vortex streets: a biological and computational approach to understanding collective behavior in wild fish
Combines field data and computer models to study how vortex streets influence fish schooling.
The Neural and Genetic Architecture Underlying Lateral Line Evolution
Explores the genes and neural circuits that shaped the evolution of the fish lateral line sensory system.
Understanding the role of Tmc proteins in hair cell mechanotransduction of zebrafish
Uses zebrafish to determine how Tmc proteins enable hair cells to convert mechanical signals into neural activity.
Summaries are written by AI in plain language from public symposium abstracts and may be imperfect.
Recent papers, explained
- Adult zebrafish favor vision over flow sensing in increasingly complex hydrodynamic environments
2026 · Current Biology
- Towards the yin and yang of fish locomotion: linking energetics, ecology and mechanics through field and lab approaches
2025 · Journal of Experimental Biology
Shows how fish swimming near objects uses different energy and movement patterns than steady swimming.
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- Filter feeding in devil rays is highly sensitive to morphology
2025 · Proceedings of the Royal Society B Biological Sciences
Tests how changes in devil ray filter shapes affect how well they catch food.
- Fish couple forecasting with feedback control to chase and capture moving prey
2024 · Proceedings of the Royal Society B Biological Sciences
Tests whether simple feedback control explains how fish chase and catch moving prey.
- Swimming kinematics of rainbow trout behind a 3×5 cylinder array: a computationally driven experimental approach to understanding fish locomotion
2024 · Journal of Experimental Biology
Compares how rainbow trout swim in different vortex patterns made by cylinder arrays.
Plain-language summaries are AI-written and reviewed by us; check the paper for details.
How to reach out
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