Biography
My central research aim is to unravel the fundamental mechanisms by which the mammalian brain represents, stores and processes information. In my lab, we study how neuronal populations represent the sensory world, and we analyze the expression and use of memories during wakefulness or sleep.
Understanding how animals use memories to guide their behavior helps us map the basic operations of memory systems in the brain and provides us with clues on where these systems fail in diseases such as Alzheimer’s, epilepsy or different sleep disorders.
Online highlights
Short CV
Since 2020 — Associate Professor, Brain & Cognition, KU Leuven
2012-2020 — Assistant Professor, Brain & Cognition, KU Leuven
2011-2022 — Group Leader at NERF (VIB, IMEC and KU Leuven)
2003-2011 — Post-Doctoral Fellow & Associate with Matthew Wilson, MIT
1998-2003 — PhD Neurobiology, University of Amsterdam, The Netherlands
1994-1998 — MSc Medical Biology, University of Amsterdam, The Netherlands
Research highlights
We showed that sleep reactivation boosts memory consolidation of highly rewarded experiences.
Read: Michon et al. (2019)
We showed that reward-responsive neurons in the ventral tegmental area coordinate with the hippocampus to replay recent experience.
We built the flexible and extendible C++ software platform “Falcon” for real-time analysis and detection of neural activation patterns.
Read: Ciliberti and Kloosterman (2017) and Ciliberti et al. (2018)
We optimized neural decoding algorithms for real-time use and for application to high-density neural probes and demonstrated the real-time detection of memory reactivation patterns in behaving animals.
Read: Sodkomkham et al. (2016) and Ciliberti et al. (2018) and Hu et al. (2018)
We designed implants for easy neuropixels recordings in freely behaving rodents.
Read: Van Daal et al. (2021)
Through collaborations across KU Leuven and imec we helped advance large scale neural recording technology.
Read: Michon et al. (2016) and Van Daal et al. (2020)
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Teaching
Together with colleagues, I have set up a new Biophysics master course “Neural Systems and Circuits” at KU Leuven, to introduce students with a physics or engineering background to the current challenges and state-of-the-art methods in systems neuroscience.
Since 2014 I also teach in the Biomedical Sciences master course – Hot Topics in System and Cognitive Neurosciences, at KU Leuven (12 hrs/year)
I supervise interns, BSc, MSc and PhD students from KU Leuven and other universities and schools.
Valorization &
tech development
We develop technologies and resources for the scientific community. We filed a patent application for a method for processing sensor data in a neuroprobe.