The Department of Neurobiology continues to play an integral role in the expansion of the Neuroscience community at the University of Pittsburgh. The department has 19 tenure-stream and 9 non-tenure stream faculty with substantial research strengths in neural development, circuit function, cellular communication through receptors, channels and synapses, systems/integrative neuroscience and neurological and psychiatric diseases. Total research grant dollars for the primary faculty totaled more than $8 million in FY 2007.

The department actively integrates research efforts with other programs in the School of Medicine (Psychiatry, Pharmacology, Neurology, Neurosurgery, PCPR), the School of Engineering and in the Faculty of Arts and Sciences (Mathematics, Physics, Neuroscience). There are 20 secondary and adjunct faculty appointments in the department, including four from the Carnegie Museum of Natural History. Of significance was the establishment in 2007 of the Systems Neuroscience Institute (SNI) in the School of Medicine under the direction of Neurobiology professor, Dr. Peter Strick. The SNI will serve to enhance the overall neuroscience community at the University of Pittsburgh.

The department invests substantial time and energy in the education of medical and graduate students. The faculty are part of the cross-campus Ph.D. training program, the Center for Neuroscience program, which includes more than 80 training faculty in the School of Medicine and the Faculty of Arts and Sciences. Neurobiology faculty serve as directors of three Medical School courses and participate as lecturers or PBL leaders in Medical Anatomy, Musculoskeletal Block, Clinical Correlations, Cell and Tissue Structure, and Medical Neuroscience. Graduate teaching in core courses includes Foundations of Biomedical Sciences, Cell and Molecular Neurobiology and Systems Neurobiology. Faculty also teach advanced graduate courses, and participate in a number of different graduate student-oriented journal clubs.

A biweekly seminar series is held throughout the academic year and hosts prominent guests from other universities, as well as faculty from the University of Pittsburgh/Carnegie-Mellon University community. The department also has an in-house seminar series to provide an opportunity for postdoctoral fellows, students and faculty to present their latest work to the department.