TEAM

Mazen Kheirbek, PhD
***Principal Investigator***
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Jeremy Biane

Jeremy Biane is a postdoctoral scholar in the lab. His research strives to bring together the disciplines of cellular, systems and behavioral neuroscience to garner a comprehensive understanding of learning, mood and behavior. To this end he employs a broad array of techniques, including in vivo calcium imaging, optogenetics, slice physiology and computational analysis. Current interests include the evolution and stability of neural signals in the hippocampus during learning, the processing and routing of emotional stimuli, and the role of the insular cortex in addiction. Contact: jeremy.biane@ucsf.edu

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Frances Xia

Frances is a postdoctoral scholar in the lab. She received her B.S. in Pharmacology from the University of British Columbia, prior to completing her PhD in Physiology at the University of Toronto. In her graduate work with Paul Frankland, Frances studied mechanisms underlying memory consolidation using in vivo electrophysiology in mice. In the Kheirbek lab, Frances is applying optical and high-density electrophysiological recording methods to study neural dynamics that drive behavior.

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Alexandra Klein

Alexandra is a postdoctoral scholar in the lab. She received her Bachelor’s degree in Biology at Ludwig Maximilian University in Munich and her Master’s degree in Medical Neuroscience at Charité University Medicine in Berlin. During her PhD studies in Nadine Gogolla’s lab at the Max Planck Institute of Neurobiology in Munich, she became very interested in interoception and how signals from brain and body, in particular the heart, interact to regulate emotions. In the Kheirbek lab, Alexandra wants to focus on the effects of bodily signals on emotional behaviors and how these interoceptive signals are processed in the brain.

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Greg Telian

Greg is a postdoctoral scholar in the lab. He received his BS in Brain and Cognitive Sciences at MIT and his PhD in Neuroscience at UC Berkeley with Hillel Adesnik. At UC Berkeley, Greg studied sensory processing in the mouse whisker system, focusing on sensory coding in whisker motor cortex. In the Kheirbek lab, Greg combines high density recordings in interconnected brain areas and optical perturbations with machine learning to better identify neural signatures of anxiety related behavior and the mechanisms that modulate them.

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Josh Bratsch-Prince

Josh is a postdoctoral scholar in the lab. He received his B.S. in Biology from Iowa State University before completing his PhD in David Mott’s lab at the University of South Carolina. In his graduate work he studied the circuit mechanisms by which the neurotransmitter acetylcholine modulates oscillations in the amygdala. In the Kheirbek lab, Josh is utilizing in vivo imaging, optogenetics, and slice electrophysiology to study the role that different cell types play in shaping the activity of the ventral hippocampus during emotional behaviors and learning.

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Manasi Iyer, PhD

Postdoctoral Scholar

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Manasi

Manasi graduated from Williams College, where her interest in neuroscience began as a senior thesis student with Matt Carter. After college, she worked as a technician in Saul Villeda’s lab at UCSF, where she studied epigenetic regulators of brain aging and rejuvenation. Manasi then moved down the peninsula and did her PhD at Stanford in Brad Zuchero’s lab. Her dissertation centered around how calcium signaling regulates the oligodendrocyte cytoskeleton which, in turn, controls developmental CNS myelination. As a postdoc in the Kheirbek lab, she is excited to explore how myelin plasticity regulates neural circuit dynamics that support long-term fear memories. Outside of lab, Manasi is an avid reader, baker, and dog-spotter.

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Mark Gergues

Mark (pronouns:he/him/his) is a PhD student in the Neuroscience Program at UCSF. He received his B.A. in Cell Biology & Neuroscience, Psychology, and Cognitive Science at Rutgers University - New Brunswick in 2016. During his undergraduate studies, he worked under Dr. George Wagner studying mechanisms of reactive oxygen species and Parkinson’s Disease. After graduating, he worked as a lab manager/technician for Dr. Benjamin Samuels studying neurobiological mechanisms of stress and antidepressant treatment response, as well as, Dr. Kasia Bieszczad studying epigenetic modulation of long-term memory formation. His current research leverages modern system neuroscience approaches, optogenetics and in vivo calcium imaging, to study neural circuit mechanisms of emotional behaviors.

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Victoria Turner

Victoria completed her bachelor’s degree in Neuroscience at Amherst College in 2014 as a QuestBridge Match Scholar. After graduation, she worked in Albert Chen’s lab at Nanyang Technological University, Singapore, analyzing gene expression of cerebellar nuclei. She joined the Kheirbek Lab at UCSF in 2016, where her research focuses on ventral hippocampal circuits activated in response to stress. Her research applies calcium imaging, optogenetics, and chemogenetics to understand stress regulation and advance our understanding of stress-related psychiatric illness.

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Rachel O'Sullivan

Rachel is a PhD student in the neuro grad program at UCSF. She did her undergrad at Williams College (’17) where she majored in biology with a concentration in neuroscience. After graduating, she moved to NYC and worked as an RA at Kallyope, a biotech company studying the gut-brain axis. In the Kheirbek lab, she is focusing on vHPC circuits and how they mediate different aspects of anxiety.

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Hye Sun (Sunny) Choi

Sunny is a PhD student in the Neuroscience Graduate Program at UCSF. She received her B.A. from University of California, Berkeley. She previously worked in the Kheirbek lab as a research technician, where she looked at the architecture of the ventral hippocampus and the role of oligodendrocytes in fear memories. For her graduate work she is interested in the neuromodulation of hippocampal circuits.

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Lahin Lalani

Lahin is a PhD student in the Neuroscience Graduate Program at UCSF. She received her B.S. in Neuroscience from the University of Michigan ('19). During her undergraduate studies, she worked under Dr. Jill Becker studying sex differences in cocaine addiction. After graduating, she worked as an RA for the Animal Behavior and Physiology Core at Boston Children's Hospital directed by Dr. Mustafa Sahin and Dr. Alexander Rotenberg. Here, she collaborated with various labs studying autism and epilepsy disorders to test novel pharmacological interventions. For her graduate work, she is interested in studying the effect stress has on myelination.

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Mingkang

Mingkang is a PhD student in the neuroscience graduate program at UCSF. She completed her undergraduate work at the University of Washington majoring in both neuroscience and psychology. While in college, she conducted research in Dr. Michael Bruchas’ lab, investigating neuromodulator dynamics in pain/reward experiments. She then worked as a technician in Dr. Vijay Namboodiri’s lab at UCSF, where she explored the neural circuits associated with associative learning and memory. In her graduate studies, Mingkang aims to use various techniques, such as behavior analysis, calcium imaging, and optogenetics, to continue investigating the mechanisms of learning and memory in different brain areas, including the hippocampal circuit and cortices.

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Gabriel Mateo-Semidey
***Joint graduate student in the Sohal and Kheirbek labs***

Andrew Kwon

Andrew is currently a Junior Specialist in the lab. He received his B.A. in Molecular/Cellular Biology - Neurobiology and Public Health from UC Berkeley in 2023. Previously, he studied early detection methods and therapeutics for Alzheimer’s Disease in Dr. Maya Koronyo’s lab at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles. In the Kheirbek Lab, he has studied the role of different types of interneurons in learning within the ventral hippocampus, and is currently studying neural circuits in the dentate gyrus.

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