What is the topic of your PhD project, and how does your work look in practice?
The topic of my PhD is investigating internally generated visual representations in the brain, and how these representations are affected when interfered with by actual visual contents. In other words, what happens in the brain when we are fully immersed in our audiobook – imagining the story with great visual detail – fully detached from what happens in the train around us? Since I started in September this year, my current work is mostly related to reading up articles on my topic and coming up with ideas for my first project. Since I am part of two labs at two centers, I spend some of my working days at DCCN and the other days at the DCC. Being part of two labs also means to lab meetings, etc., which means I have to learn ASAP when not to go to meetings.
What did you want to be when you were younger?
I had many periods of different interests when I was younger. There were times when I was fascinated by dinosaurs or times when I was fully into the planets and stars (probably enhanced by a still-present love for Star Wars). Nonetheless, I have pictures of a friendship book (if you call it that in English) from my best friend back then, where I wrote that I want to be a soccer star. I guess that’s a tale of growing up with strong gender-based expectations on what a boy should become.
What has your career path been so far and how did you come to your current position?
My story is very linear and boring: in high school, I was interested in Neurobiology and Psychology, so I decided to try it out in a Psychology Bachelor’s at Maastricht University right after high school finished; it turned out to be the correct choice. During my Bachelors, I learned to love Neuroscience even more, and decided to follow it up right away with a Master’s in Cognitive Neuroscience to dive deeper into the contents I found most interesting - also in Maastricht. For my thesis internship, I came to the Predictive Brain Lab by Floris de Lange. I had a great time and wanted to stay part of the Donders community, so I applied for a position that opened with Marius Peelen. After some bureaucracy (long story, I can elaborate in person), I ended up with a position supervised by both Floris and Marius - so that’s how I ended up here.
What is your favorite book and why?
I don’t believe in absolute favorites – mostly because I don’t read a ton, but I have a book that I read recently and really enjoyed. The name is “Solaris” by Stanislaw Lem, and it is about a psychologist (see, space again) travelling to a space station, where weird things are happening to the crew. The book was also adapted into a great movie of the same name by Soviet director Andrei Tarkovsky.