Peter Janssen (MD, PhD) is a full professor in Neurophysiology at the Katholieke Universiteit (KU) Leuven, Belgium. His expertise includes single-cell recordings, microstimulation, reversible inactivation and functional imaging in nonhuman primates, and invasive recordings in humans. The main research topics of his lab are the neural basis of three-dimensional vision, visuomotor transformations for object grasping, the neural effects of various noninvasive neuromodulation techniques, visual cortical prosthesis and other brain-machine interfaces. He has obtained a European Research Council (ERC) Consolidator grant (2010-2015)., He was the chair of the Department of Neurosciences from 2016 to 2020 and a member of CARE since 2016.

Kate Jeffery is Professor of Behavioural Neuroscience at University College London. Her scientific research explores how the brain makes an internal map of space for use in navigation and memory, using electrophysiological recordings in behaving rodents. She heads the Institute of Behavioural Neuroscience in the Division of Psychology and Language Sciences at UCL, and is co-director of the electrophysiology company Axona Ltd. She is also a Fellow of the Royal Society of Biology, Fellow and Vice-President of the Royal Institute of Navigation, in which she also chairs the Cognition and Navigation special interest group.

Anna Mitchell is the Head of the Thalamus, Cortex, and Cognition Laboratory in the Department of Experimental Psychology at Oxford University. She is an Associate Professor and a Wellcome Trust Senior Research Fellow since 2016. Anna received her PhD in Psychology and Behavioural Neuroscience at University of Canterbury, in New Zealand in 2004 (supervisor: Professor John Dalrymple-Alford). Dr Mitchell studies the neurobiology of learning and decision-making focusing on the contributions of the dorsal medial thalamus and interconnected structures in health and disease using animal models and humans. She is also interested in how the thalamus and cortex contribute to learning, remembering, and updating our whereabouts in our visual environment. Her laboratory uses several approaches to investigate their research questions including: neurophysiology, neuroimaging, neuroanatomy, and cognitive, physiological, and behavioral assessments.

Dr Mitchell is Co-Editor in Chief of Current Research in Neurobiology; a board member for Understanding Animal Research; and the scientific rep on the Animal Welfare Ethical Review Panel at the UK Centre for Macaques.

Details about Dr Mitchell’s current work, publications, and videos showing some of the research methods involved can be found here https://www.psy.ox.ac.uk/research/the-oxford-cognitive-thalamus-laboratory  and here https://www.psy.ox.ac.uk/team/anna-mitchell

Prof. Pisani is professor of Neurology at Pavia University, and Mondino Neurological Institute. He is a physician-scientist with a long-standing interest in the basic and clinical aspects of basal ganglia function and dysfunction, and coordinates a research group of both preclinical and clinical fellows. By utilizing electrophysiology techniques he investigated the physiology of striatal neurons and the expression of activity-dependent plasticity at corticostriatal synapses. He extensively studied the crucial role of neurotransmitters in striatal function and dysfunction, in understanding the pathophysiology of movement disorders, in particular Parkinson’s disease and dystonia. His clinical activity is centered on patients with Parkinson’s disease and other movement disorders and is actively involved in patients’ association activities. The relevance of this work has been recognized with international awards, and in 2019 he received the Michael J. Fox Foundation “Bachmann-Strauss Prize for Excellence in Dystonia Research”. He authored and co-authored more than 250 papers, with an H-index of 62, and is listed among the “Top Italian Scientists” (http://www.topitalianscientists.org). He is on the board of international and national societies, as well as in the editorial board of peer-review journals.

Rosa Mª Señarís Rodríguez, Full Professor of Physiology in the University of Santiago de Compostela since 2007. PI of the research group: Neuroendocrinology, metabolism and cancer in the Research Center of Molecular Medicine and Chronic Diseases (CIMUS). University of Santiago de Compostela. Graduate in Medicine in the University of Santiago de Compostela (1986). MD, PhD in Medicine (Neuroscience). University of Santiago de Compostela (1990). Postdoctoral fellow in the Department of Neurobiology (MRC). Cambridge. UK (1991-1993), in the Department of Neurosciences. University of Aarhus (1994), and in the Department of Medicine. University of McGill. Montreal. Canada (1996). Director of the Department of Physiology. University of Santiago de Compostela (2010-2014). My research has been focused in understanding central and peripheral mechanisms regulating feeding, energy homeostasis and metabolism in physiological and pathological conditions. I have studied in detail the role of hormones like leptin, ghrelin, steroids, cytokines and recently the role of sensory ion channels like TRPM8 and TRPA1 in the interplay between thermoregulation and energy balance. Lately, I have also included in my research lines the study of the metabolism of cancer, focusing not only on the metabolism of cancer cells but also in the metabolic regulation during cancer, searching for new therapeutic strategies in this disease.