Andrey Fyodorovich Iznak is the head of the laboratory of neurophysiology, doctor of biology, professor. He upheld his PhD's thesis “Microelectrode analysis of the rhythm of sleep spins in subcortical structures of the rat brain” in 1971 and defended his doctoral thesis “Functional significance of alfa-type activity of the brain” in 1988. His scientific interests involve electrophysiological correlates of functional states in normals (during education, operating activities) and in various type of mental pathology (affective disorders, cognitive disorders in childhood and in the elderly), neurophysiological mechanisms of mental pathology. A.F. Iznak is an author of more than 130 scientific publications, one monograph and a number of group monographs. Under his scientific supervision, 1 doctoral and 7 PhD's theses have been prepared and successfully upheld. A.F. Iznak is a member of editorial board of the journal “Human Physiology”, member of the Problem Commission on brain mapping of RAS, on biological background of mental disorders and biological psychiatry of RAMS, member of the Council of the Association of clinical neurophysiology and electroencephalography, of the International Brain Research Organization (IBRO), International Society on Brain Electromagnetic Topography (ISBET), of the International Society of Neuroimaging in Psychiatry (ISNIP) and of the American Association of Electrophysiologists in Psychiatry, as well as member of the New York Academy of Sciences.

The laboratory was one of the first laboratories of the Institute of Psychiatry of AMS USSR, created in 1944. The research development in the laboratory fully reflects the development of national electroencephalography in medicine and psychiatry. M.N. Livanov, who was the first Head of the laboratory, was known as the inventor of an encephaloscope (a precedent of modern computer systems of brain mapping) that allowed to register and simultaneously show on the screen (as shining dots) the bioelectric potentials from numerous brain points. At present, this laboratory has all modern methods of electroencephalography with an automatic computer analysis and EEG mapping. It is on of the leading centres of the country in the development of new methods of electroencephalography and training of specialists in the field.

The laboratory is staffed with 14 research fellows.

The general structure of the laboratory includes the study group on characteristic features of EEG in mental disorders of childhood.

Scope of research activities of the laboratory:

• Investigation of neurophysiological and psychophysiological correlates of various types of mental pathology, aimed to approach the understanding of the pathogenesis of respective diseases, to elaborate objective criteria for their diagnostics and prediction of treatment efficacy.
• Creation of a database on EEG ontogenesis.
• Identification electroencephalographic parameters related to psychiatric pathology, with age-related details (in various types of oligophrenia, child autism, in dementias of old age and endogenous psychoses).
• Development of original computerized methods and software for quantitative analysis of EEG during psychophysiological assessment of emotions and emotional disorders.