NPP Seminar: Dr Sepiedeh Keshavarzi, University College London

Sepiedeh obtained her Medical Doctorate from Tehran University of Medical Sciences in Iran and her PhD in Neuroscience from the University of Queensland in Australia, where she studied the organisation of olfactory amygdala circuits with Pankaj Sah. She then joined Troy Margrie’s lab at UCL as a postdoctoral fellow. Sepiedeh studies how the brain combines vestibular and visual signals to keep track of one’s own motion and orientation. Her work is particularly focused on neural circuits engaging the retrosplenial and visual cortices.  She uses two photon calcium imaging and electrophysiological techniques to record the activity of cortical neurons in head fixed and freely moving mice. She also investigates the functional properties of these neurons in the context of their input connectivity using viral tracing and whole brain imaging techniques. The findings of her research will help better understand the neural basis of motion perception and spatial navigation.