The Principal Investigator, Yang Zhang, is a tenure-track faculty in the Department of Speech-Language-Hearing Sciences and faculty member of the Center for Neurobehavioral Development, University of Minnesota. Zhang obtained his PhD in Speech & Hearing Sciences from University of Washington, Seattle (Committee members: Patricia Kuhl; Toshiaki Imada; David Corina; Lee Osterhout; Margaret Rogers), MA in Linguistics from University of Iowa, IA (Advisor: Catherine Ringen), and BS in English for Science & Technology at Shanghai Jiaotong University, China. He studied psycholinguistics with Professor Richard Hurtig when at Iowa, and received training in brain imaging at University of Washington, the Communication Science Laboratories and Basic Research Laboratories of Nippon Telephone & Telegraph Corporation in Japan. Zhang is a native of Pujiang County, Zhejiang Province, China.

Zhang's specialties include

* auditory neuroscience
* speech and voice perception
* learning and cognitive development
* magnetocephalography (MEG), event-related potentials (ERP), functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging (fMRI)

Zhang conducts an active research program with collaborators home and abroad. Many students at doctoral, master, and undergraduate levels have been involved in research projects in Zhang lab.