TReND-CaMinA — Teaching Computational Neuroscience in Africa

TReND-CaMinA is an intensive computational neuroscience & machine learning course for African students that provides a fully funded scholarship for participants, including travel and accommodation. I gave a lecture on MRI in computational neuroscience, led Python tutorials, and mentored a group of students to pursue a research project using the Allen calcium-imaging dataset (mouse visual cortex).

Teaching students from a broad variety of backgrounds and cultures is extremely rewarding and horizon-widening. The selected students aren't only talented and bright, but also extremely keen to learn, grow, and share their knowledge, making it an inspiring learning and teaching environment.

TReND-CaMinA (official).

Sex-bias in cortical and hippocampal microstructure

The female data gap is everywhere — much of neuroscience has historically relied on male participants or male animals, leaving large gaps in knowledge about the female body and brain. In this project we investigated how female sex hormones influence brain structure.

We analysed regional microstructure of the cerebral cortex using MRI in over 1,000 healthy women and men. We showed there are sex-specific regional differences in cortical and hippocampal microstructure, and that these differences vary with women’s hormone profiles — in some cases differences disappear or reverse. Effects were concentrated in regions with high expression of estrogen receptors and genes involved in sex-hormone synthesis, suggesting sex hormones modulate microstructural plasticity.

Paper & data: Nature Communications (PDF)

be.boosted — Leadership, Coaching & Community Building

I first joined be.boosted as a fellow, selected into an international cohort of highly motivated students focused on leadership, public speaking, negotiation, and group dynamics. The program exposed me to intensive training formats, including a Model United Nations simulation in London, and to a community that continuously challenged me to grow — intellectually, socially, and personally.

After completing the fellowship, I stayed involved as a volunteer mentor and member of the recruiting team, supporting the next generation of fellows. I was later selected as a coach, which involved designing and delivering a full workshop series together with my co-coaches, mentoring a team of fellows over several months, and leading them through a Model UN simulation. This role required sustained commitment, careful feedback, and adapting leadership styles to very different personalities and group dynamics.

I was subsequently elected to the board during a challenging phase for the organization. Together with the other board members, I treated this as an opportunity to stabilize and reorient BE.BOOSTED. We worked intensively on strategy, internal communication, and structure, introducing clearer interfaces between teams, founding a dedicated DEI team with defined goals and evaluation criteria, strengthening the alumni network, and expanding financial outreach. Much of this work felt like building a small start-up: navigating ambiguity, making decisions with incomplete information, and aligning a group of highly driven individuals around shared values.

Today, I remain involved as a mentor for fellows and trainers. What has stayed most meaningful to me is the opportunity to give back — enabling younger students to grow, experiment, and gain confidence in leadership roles, just as others once did for me.

BE.BOOSTED (official)