Nicholas Benfey is a senior PhD Candidate in the Ruthazer lab researching how radial astrocytes, the resident glial cells in the Xenopus laevis optic tectum, are recruited by, and actively modulate, sensory driven neuronal activity in vivo during early development. He is particularly interested in the role that arousal state plays in modulating both glial and neuronal signalling in the visual system, and how targeted activation of glial cells alters sensory processing at both the cellular and circuit levels.