[1] At the McGovern Institute, Desimone works on promoting the development of systems neuroscience, novel neuroscience technologies, and the translation of basic research findings into new treatments that improve human health, including new approaches to brain disorders such as autism and schizophrenia.
[2][3] From 2014-2019 and again in 2023, Desimone appeared as an international judge and team leader on The Brain, a competition showing unique mental skills.
As a graduate student at Princeton, Desimone and his thesis supervisor Charles Gross published the first data that neurons respond specifically to faces.
[4][5] While working at the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH), he studied the physiological properties [6] of neurons in extrastriate visual cortex, and together with Leslie Ungerleider, he mapped the topographic organization and anatomical connections [7] of many new cortical visual areas.
[8] He reported evidence for the role of attention in modulating the neuronal properties of areas in the ventral stream,[9] and he and John Duncan proposed a biased competition theory to explain many aspects of attention control.