Icahn School of Medicine at Mout Sinai (ISMMS)
Department of Neuroscience, Department of Neurosurgery, Department of Neurology, Friedman Brain Institute
Director, Laboratory for Human Neurophysiology
Ayaka Kato is a postdoctoral fellow at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, under the mentorship of Dr. Ignacio Saez and Dr. Xiaosi Gu. She attained her Ph.D. from the University of Tokyo in March 2023 and holds a Master of Science in Neuroscience from the University of Oxford and a Bachelor and a Master of Biological Science from the University of Tokyo. Ayaka's research focus encompasses computational psychiatry, dopamine, motivation, and addiction. She employs computational modeling, intracranial recording, and neuroimaging techniques to investigate these areas of study.
Parul Jain received her PhD in Physiology, Biophysics and Systems Biology, from Weill Cornell Medicine. Her postdoctoral research looks at the learning and social impairments observed in many psychiatric diseases. Her work encompasses a broad range of topics in the field of affective cognition including the hippocampal maps associated with social interactions, reinforcement learning in misophonia, and social cognition in autism spectrum disorder.
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Ella is interested in neural underpinnings of subjective experience and complex behaviour observed during active engagement with one’s environment. She uses intracranial electrophysiology, video recordings and eye-tracking during naturalistic interpersonal exchange involving verbal and non-verbal components. Ella previously conducted research at New York University, Rutgers University and Weizmann Institute of Science and is currently co-mentored by Ignacio Saez and Daniela Schiller at Mount Sinai.
Salman is interested in discovering how our experiences, choices and feelings dictate how we remember the past. He uses computational models to untangle these complex aspects of human cognition, and direct-brain recordings in humans to tap into the specific neural circuits involved. Salman's ultimate goal is to translate the neural and computational findings from this research into new therapeutic strategies for neurological and psychiatric disorders that result in impaired or dysregulated memory.
Soyeon Jun is a postdoctoral researcher in the Saez Lab, using intracranial EEG, Single Unit, and brain stimulation to try to understand the neurophysiological basis of learning and memory.
Born in Xi'an, China, Lu Jin completed her undergrad at Zhejiang University and pursued a Neurobiology Ph.D. at Yale, researching working memory circuits in primates' prefrontal cortex. She later earned an M.D. from Cornell. Now, as a research track resident in the Mount Sinai Psychiatry Residency Program and the Saez Lab, she studies motivational levels through behavioral tasks and examines neural representations of motivation in human brains. Her ultimate goal is to develop circuitry-based treatments for psychiatric conditions. Outside academia, she enjoys rock climbing, exploring history, and learning about political issues.
Gelana Tostaeva (she/her) is a Neuroscience PhD student co-mentored by Ignacio Saez, PhD and Daniela Schiller, PhD. Gelana is broadly interested in the computations and representations of flexible behavior in physical and social spaces. She combines intracranial recordings and computational approaches to study how the brain supports these processes with the ultimate goal of translation to social psychiatric disorders. Gelana received her B.S. in Data Science & Statistics from Minerva University. Outside of the lab, you can find her skating in Central Park.
Cristina Bañuelos is an MD-PhD student, pursuing a PhD in AI and Emerging Technologies in the Biomedical Sciences at the ISMMS. She earned her B.S. in Neuroscience from Carnegie Mellon University. She is co-mentored by Drs. Ignacio Saez, PhD and Xiaosi Gu, PhD, and plans to apply reinforcement learning models to gain insights into decision-making and feedback-based learning with neurosurgical patients. In her free time, Cristina enjoys exploring new restaurants and coffee shops throughout NYC, and spending time in Central Park.
Arianna has always been fascinated by how neurochemical and molecular interactions in the brain can give rise to the mind that creates such complex higher-order cognitive states -- such as mood, emotion, and learning. She uses intracranial neural recording techniques and computational modeling to elucidate the mechanisms underlying these cognitive processes. Specifically, she studies the neurocomputational signatures of the interplay between social learning and mood. She is an MD/PhD candidate at ISMMS in the Gu and Saez labs.
Alexandra is a Neuroscience PhD Candidate in the labs of Ignacio Saez, PhD and Xiaosi Gu, PhD. Alexandra specializes in integrating human intracranial electrophysiology with computational psychiatry to investigate decision-making and reward encoding. Her thesis work will elucidate the neurophysiological and behavioral correlates of aberrant counterfactual processing in depression. In 2020, she obtained a B.S. in Neuroscience from Duke University, where she studied under Kafui Dzirasa, MD, PhD. Alexandra will bring her expertise in neurophysiology and computational modeling to the biotechnology sector after completing her PhD.
Alexandra is an avid reader, hiker, and Rangers hockey fan.
Qixiu Fu obtained her Bachelor of Arts Degree with Honors in Psychology from New York University in 2020. Generally speaking, Qixiu is interested in understanding the computational mechanisms of psychological experiences in both healthy and pathological contexts. Right now, she is studying value-based decision making in treatment resistant depression patients who undergo deep brain stimulation. When Qixiu gets frustrated with whatever she is doing, she likes to watch anime.
Christina Maher (she/her) is a PhD student in the Saez Lab. Her research combines intracranial recording and computational modeling of behavior to investigate how people learn in dynamic environments. Christina is co-mentored by Dr. Angela Radulescu, PhD. Prior to beginning her Ph.D., Christina completed her MSc at University College London under the supervision of Dr. Tali Sharot, PhD.
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Katherine is a Clinical Research Coordinator in the Saez Lab. She graduated from Princeton University in 2024 with a degree in Neuroscience and a certificate in Cognitive Science. At Princeton, she completed her senior thesis under the mentorship of Yael Niv, PhD, investigating ADHD and reward sensitivity on social media. Katherine ultimately intends to pursue a doctoral degree in clinical psychology.
Lizbeth Nuñez is a Clinical Research Coordinator in the Nash Family Department of Neuroscience, working in the Human Neurophysiology Laboratory at Mount Sinai West.
She completed her undergraduate degrees in Molecular & Cell Biology, Neurobiology and Molecular Environmental Biology at UC Berkeley in 2020. She has been involved in electrophysiological studies at UC Berkeley and neurosurgical research at UC San Francisco and joined the team in 2021 from UC Davis. Her interests lie in neurosurgery, psychopathology, and neuroanatomy.
Current: Postdoctoral Scholar, ISMMS
Current: Clinical Research Coordinator, ISMMS
