After considering a career as an artist and working as a chef, Michael H. Dickinson graduated from Brown University in 1984 with a degree in neuroscience. He then earned his PhD in Zoology from the University of Washington in Seattle in 1989.

He joined the faculty at the University of Chicago in 1991 and moved to the University of California at Berkeley in 1995, where he is currently a professor of Integrative Biology.

Dickinson's lab, spread over several rooms in the historic Valley Life Sciences building, teems with about a dozen graduate students who study insect aerodynamics, behavior, and physiology. In addition to his research, he teaches courses in animal behavior and behavioral neurobiology.

Selected publications:

Lehmann, F.-O., and M. H. Dickinson. 1997. The changes in power requirements and muscle efficiency during elevated force production in the fruit fly, Drosophila melanogaster. J. Exp. Biol. 200:1133-43.

Dickinson, M. H., and K. G. Götz. 1996. The wake dynamics and flight forces of the fruit fly, Drosophila melanogaster. J. Exp. Biol. 199:2085-104.

Fayyazuddin, A., and M. H. Dickinson. 1996. Haltere afferents provide direct, electrotonic input to a steering motor neuron of the blowfly, Calliphora. J. Neurosci. 16:5225-32.

Tu, M., and M. H. Dickinson. 1996. The control of wing kinematics by two steering muscles of the blowfly (Calliphora vicina). J. Comp. Physiol. 178:813-30.

Dickinson, M. H., and J. B. Lighton. 1995. Muscle efficiency and elastic storage in the flight motor of Drosophila. Science 268:87-90.