Joe is a graduate student at the University of Minnesota enrolled in the Graduate Program for Neuroscience doctoral program. He earned his Bachelor of Arts in Physics and Computational Neuroscience from Ohio Wesleyan University in 2019. Before studying at the University of Minnesota, He had research experiences in neuroscience, studying epilepsy and seizures, and bioinformatics, studying proteomic data analysis techniques. His experience developing computational models of epilepsy solidified his interest in using dynamical models to better understand the brain.

He is currently working in Dr. Cheryl Olman’s lab on research in the human visual system. His research project focuses on linking data from functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) with computational models to better understand early visual processing in the primary visual area of the brain. His lab’s research has applications to the study of psychotic disorders and is aimed partly at understanding the neural mechanisms underpinning visual hallucinations and other sensory abnormalities in psychosis. Articulating early visual processing in computational models will allow us to make specific predictions about the causes of visual abnormalities and will hopefully contribute to understanding the link between sensory abnormalities and psychotic disorders.