Lab Members

Melanie I Stefan, Group leader

My research interests revolve around using computers to understand learning and memory, from simulating how proteins in the brain work together to strengthen the connection between neurons to using educational data to understand how students learn.

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Alice Salla, High school intern

My name is Alice Salla , I'm 15 and I'm passionate about dance and music. I love playing piano and using my body to express emotion. I would love to learn more about how anxiety and stress affects our brain and our body and how to regulate it. I also love traveling and discovering other countries' culture and education systems and how it affects people's mental health .

Christine Lee, PhD student

My research interests include using software to assist in analyzing student behavior on online test-taking platforms, and to hopefully help teachers better tailor their classes according to their students' needs.

Danny Schnitzler, Postdoctoral researcher

With a background in neuroendocrinology, I've investigated aspects of anxiety and stress using an in vivo model. While I still have many questions that I want an answer to, the prism of my interests has more recently shifted to focus on developing practical bioinformatics tools for innovative research. These include bioimage analysis, scientific text evaluation, and novel science communication methods. I am passionate about facilitating accessible and collaborative scientific exploration, while also contributing to the neuroscience research landscape.

Domas Linkevicius, PhD student (co-supervised with David Sterratt)

My interests primarily lie in modelling neuronal dynamics (mainly synaptic plasticity) as an interplay of electrical and biochemical activity at the level of single cells. I am interested in trying to understand how various studies on synaptic plasticity and neuronal dynamics could be reconciled (if at all) via models built in a bottom-up fashion that can explicitly include experimental conditions and assumptions whenever feasible. My interests also include trying to tackle the complexity of and shortage of data on the post-synaptic proteome by using machine learning.

Patricia Rubisch, Postdoctoral researcher

I am interested in developmental and learning processes on both the functional and mechanistic level. I believe that exploring the vast heterogeneity of the biological system in health and disease can help to identify which degree of variety is functionally relevant and differentiate them from artefacts of robustness. Using biophysically detailed models, I aim to classify these functional building blocks. By abstracting and transferring the key mechanisms to circuit models, question of their relevance in network dynamics and systems neuroscience can be explored. A special focus of mine is the influence of inhibition and interneuron activity in the regulation of plasticity for feedback driven learning in neural circuits.

Susana Román García, PhD student (co-supervised with David Sterratt)

I am interested in using computer models to understand molecular mechanisms which underly memory formation. I believe computer models offer great potential for studying Neuroscience, and I seek to bring the two together in the research that I do. I aim to move away from animal research and towards more ethical technological advancements in the Neuroscience field. My current PhD work involves using various 3D biology computational modelling software (such as MCell and Biodynamo) to create models which look at CaMKII dynamics in the postsynaptic neuron. More specifically, I look at CaMKII interactions with NMDAR and their involvement in biochemical and structural changes in Long Term Potentiation (LTP).