Meet the Team
We are a diverse group – biologists, physicists, engineers, and we record neuronal activity, look carefully at behavior and create models to test ideas.
Lab members
Eugenia Chiappe, PhD
Principal Investigator
Training: Biology & biophysics
Scientific interests: Neural mechanisms of internal representations, motor control
Techniques: Physiology, behavior, and optical imaging
Hobbies: Dancing, reading, circus arts and traveling—>—>
Kathrin Steck, PhD
Research Specialist
Training: Behavior, chemical ecology and neuroscience
Scientific interests: Behavior and navigation
Techniques: Behavior, genetics and anatomy
Hobbies: Cycling and outdoor activities, traveling
Terufumi Fujiwara, PhD
Postdoctoral Fellow, JSPS Fellow
Training: Engineer & neuroscience
Scientific interests: Motor representations, motor learning, internal states
Techniques: Electrophysiology, optical imaging, behavior, genetics
Hobbies: Arts, classical music, Chinese (and Japanese) poems, patching!—>—>
Mert Erginkaya
2012 INDP PhD Student
Training: Molecular biology & genetics
Scientific interests: Neural mechanisms of internal representations, sensorimotor transformations
Techniques: Anatomy, physiology and behavior
Hobbies: Traveling, basketball, surf, guitar & drums (we have our own CNP band!!)
Nelia Varela, PhD
Research Specialist
Training: Agronomy engineer and Neuroscience
Scientific interests: Neural processing and Behavior
Techniques: Imaging, anatomy, behavior, genetics
Hobbies: Reading, cycling and traveling —>—>—>—>—>—>—>
Tomás Cruz
2014 INDP PhD Student
Training: Physics engineer & neuroscience
Scientific interests: Sensory processing, predictive learning, motor control
Techniques: Behavior, modeling, virtual reality, and physiology
Hobbies: Reading, traveling, music, and sports
Andre Marques
2017 INPD PhD student
Training: Physics & engineer
Scientific interests: Neural networks and multi-sensory integration
Techniques: Modeling, computation and physiology
Hobbies: Basketball (Go Lakers!), cartoons, reading and gaming
Wynne Stagnaro
Research Assistant
Training: Neurobiology
Scientific interests: Behavior, Neural Circuits
Techniques: Optical imaging, behavior
Hobbies: Playing music, traveling, reading
João Marques
Postdoctoral fellow
Training: Neurosciences
Scientific interests: How the brain produces behavior
Techniques: Optical imaging, behavioral categorization
Hobbies: Surfing
Nuno Rito
2017 INDP PhD student
Training: Biomedical engineer
Scientific interests: Neural circuits, visuomotor integration, motor control
Techniques: Behavior, genetics, control theory, and physiology
Hobbies: Gaming, soccer, foosball, swimming, traveling
Ece Sönmez
Research Assistant
Training: Molecular Biology & genetics
Scientific interests: Behavior
Techniques: Optical imaging, genetics, anatomy
Hobbies: Reading, traveling, sports & cinema
Sebastián Malagón
Research Assistant
Training: Electrical engineer & neuroscience
Scientific interests: Animal behavior
Techniques: Signal processing, machine learning
Hobbies: Yoga, meditation, camping & trekking
Miguel Paço
2017 INDP PhD student
Training: Biological engineer
Scientific interests: Neural circuits and computations
Techniques: Optical imaging, behavior, modeling
Hobbies: Gaming, anime & cartoons, digital art, ethology, and music
Rita Saraiva
Lab Administrator
Training: Molecular Biology & Physiology
Scientific interests: Molecular physiology
Techniques: Protein-protein interactions
Hobbies: Music and harp playing, cinema & arts
Paavo Huoviala
Postdoctoral fellow
Training: Neuroscience, Pscychology
Scientific interests: Structure and function of neural circuits for computation and behavior
Techniques: Behavior, Virtual Reality, Optical Imaging, Computational neuroanatomy
Hobbies: Writing, playing music, books
Lab Alumni
James Bohnslav
Research Assistant 2013-2015
Current Position: PhD student candidate, Harvard Program in Neuroscience, Christopher Harvey’s Lab
Current scientific interests: Information processing in cortex
Contact: JBohnslav@gmail.com
Diana Amaro
Research Assistant 2014-2015
Current Position: PhD student candidate in the group of Prof. Benedikt Grothe, Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München
Current scientific interests: Sound localization, auditory scene analysis
Contact:diana.amaro@bio.lmu.de
Anabel Rodriguez Simões
Research Assistant 2015-2016
Current Position: PhD student candidate in the group of Christa Rhiner, Champalimaud Cancer Research Programme
Current scientific interests: Neural stem cell physiology