Friedemann Zenke, PhD
https://fzenke.net
Principal Investigator
Fabian Mikulasch — Post-doc (starting 2025)
PhD in Computational Neuroscience at Max-Planck Institute for Dynamics and Self-organization. MSc in Complex Systems, Chalmers, Göteborg. BSc in Cognitive Science, Uni Tübingen. I am interested in the principles of representation and world model learning in artificial and biological neural systems.
Mattias Nilsson, PhD — Post-doc (since 2023)
Ph.D. in Neuromorphic Computing and M.Sc. in Engineering Physics from Luleå University of Technology, Sweden. I am interested in spiking neural networks and their application on emerging neuromorphic hardware for efficient computation, such as for edge AI applications.
Peter Buttaroni — PhD student (since 2022)
MSc in Quantitative Finance at Luiss Guido Carli (IT) and MSc in AI from the Università della Svizzera Italiana (CH). I am interested in Reinforcement Learning algorithms and how biological principles can be used to improve artificial neural networks.
Julia Gygax— PhD student (since 2022)
https://jgygax.github.io/
BSc in Electrical Engineering and Information Technology, ETHZ. MSc in Biomedical Engineering from ETHZ. I am interested in how concepts of biological neural networks can be applied to artificial neural networks and in training of spiking neural networks.
Manu Srinath Halvagal — PhD student (since 2020)
https://mshalvagal.github.io
M.Sc, Microengineering with a minor in Computational Neuroscience, EPFL and B.Tech, Electrical Engineering, IIT Madras. I am interested in the mechanisms of unsupervised and self-supervised perceptual learning in networks of biological neurons, and the role of top-down connections therein. I am also interested in exploring whether we could use these principles to improve machine learning algorithms.
Ashena Gorgan Mohammadi — PhD student (since 2023)
MSc in Computer Science from University of Tehran. My main interest is to develop bio-plausible intelligent systems in broad terms. More specifically, I am interested in how we can simulate predictive and continual learning in a spiking model of columnar architecture of the neocortex.
Julian Rossbroich — PhD student (since 2020)
Joint MSc in Neuroscience from Université Laval and Université de Bordeaux. My main interest concerns the neuronal signatures of learning and memory. Specifically, I am interested in how cortical circuits compute predictions of sensory inputs, and how such predictive processing is involved in learning and plasticity.
Collaborators and co-advised students
Claire Meissner-Bernard, Post-doc
with Rainer Friedrich, FMI.
Simon Narduzzi, PhD student
co-advised by Shih-Chii Liu, Institute of Neuroinformatics (UZH/ETHZ) and L. Andrea Dunbar, CSEM.
MSc in computer science and computational neuroscience (EPFL). My research focuses on developing efficient neural networks for ultra-low power neuromorphic hardware.
Luke Taylor, Post-doc
co-advised with Nicol Harper and Andy King, University of Oxford.
MSc Neuroscience (Oxford), BSc Applied Mathematics and Computer Science (UCT). I am interested in training spiking neural networks and exploring their applicability to studying the brain.
Alumni
- Julius Wurzler (2024) → MSc in Bioinformatics, University of Tübingen
- Aaron Spieler (2024) → MSc in Neural Information Processing, University of Tübingen
- Tengjun Liu (2023–2024) → PhD student at Zhejiang University
- Axel Laborieux (2021–2024) → Research scientist, Huawei Research
- Jeremias Seitz (2022–2024)
- Manvi Agarwal (2021–2022) → PhD student, Télécom Paris, Institut Polytechnique de Paris
- Siegfried Schwartz (2022) → CS student (bachelor) at TU Vienna
- Peter Buttaroni (2022) → PhD student, Zenke Lab
- Yue Kris Wu (2019–2022) → PhD student, TU Munich
- Nikolaos Papanikolaou (2021–2022) → PhD student, University of Stuttgart, Germany
- Guillermo Martin Sanchez (2021–2022) → PhD student, Champalimaud
- Julia Gygax (2021) → PhD student, Zenke Lab
- Matthias Depoortere (2020) → AI/ML Engineer at GSK Vaccines
- Tianlin Liu (2019–2020) → PhD student, University of Basel
Former collaborators and external students
- Bastian Eichenberger, FMI, PhD student (2020–2023), co-advised with Jeff Chao and Guillaume Diss → Independent consultant
- Sebastian Billaudelle, University of Heidelberg, PhD student (2021–2022), co-advised with Johannes Schemmel → Postdoc, INI, Uni and ETH Zurich
- Benjamin Cramer, University of Heidelberg, PhD student (2019–2022), co-advised with Johannes Schemmel → Staff scientist, Bosch Research