PhD committee

My name is Charles David, and I am a first-year Ph.D. student at School for Mental Health and Neuroscience (MHeNs), Maastricht University. My research is part of the YOD-INCLUDED study and involves early recognition of Young Onset Dementia (YOD) within the general practice. The aim is to shorten the diagnosis time and identify red flags that can aid in early identification within primary care leading to timely referrals to memory clinics. Furthermore, within YOD-INCLUDED we aim to set up a national YOD cohort where we will include everyone who had/has/may have a YOD diagnosis.
I am fortunate to be a part of the EURON network and a member of the Ph.D. committee. I look forward to promoting scientific collaboration among EURON partners, share insights, and gain relevant skills.

My name is Siyang Peng, and I have been a PhD student at the School for Mental Health and Neuroscience at Maastricht University since the end of 2023. My research mainly focuses on the pre-clinical assessment of novel therapies in animal models for myasthenia gravis, an autoantibody mediated neuromuscular junction disorder. I have also been working on the detection of autoantibodies in autoimmune encephalitis using different techniques. It is my great honor to join the PhD committee and be part of the EURON network. I would like to help encourage researchers from our university to network and connect with other research groups among EURON, broaden horizons, and promote collaborations.

My name is Julia Koch, and I am a PhD student at the RWTH University hospital Aachen. I graduated from the Radboud University in Nijmegen, obtaining a bachelor’s in Psychology and master’s in Cognitive Neuroscience. In Aachen, I joint the Hyperscanning project led by Jun.-Prof. Dr. Lisa Wagels which follows a two-person neuroscience approach to study neural dynamics during social interactions. This project investigates the intra- and inter-brain mechanisms, as well as inter-brain synchronicity, during sibling interaction in terms of cooperative, competitive, dominant, and aggressive behaviors. I am grateful to be part of the EURON network, as it provides an excellent platform for PhD students to connect, collaborate, and broaden their research horizons. As a PhD representative for RWTH Aachen University, I am excited to actively engage with fellow PhD students and help them fully benefit from the opportunities and advantages that EURON offers.

My name is Amber Delbroek, and I started my thesis in 2024 as a joint PhD student in the Brône/Rigo team at Hasselt University and the Mechanobiology & Biomaterials group at the University of Mons. My research focuses on the influence of evolutionarily conserved key proteins on cytoskeleton organization and migration in phagocytes.

I am honored to join the EURON PhD committee and be part of this dynamic network, which gives me the opportunity to meet new people. As a representative, I aim to encourage PhD students to connect with other research groups, broaden their horizons, and take full advantage of the opportunities that EURON offers. 

My name is Sarah Chenine and I am a joint PhD student between Hasselt University and Maastricht University. My research focuses on regulatory T cells (Tregs) in multiple sclerosis (MS). Specifically, we want to investigate the epigenetic signature of Tregs across the different MS disease stages and how this signature may affect remyelination. EURON gives young researchers the opportunity to expand their scientific network and skills. As a EURON PhD representative, I would like to promote EURON and encourage PhD students to benefit from the EURON network, training programs and events.

My name is Marine Hervet, I am pursuing, since October 2024, a PhD at « Lille Neuroscience and Cognition » research center in the « Alzheimer & Tauopathie » team. My research is focused on the role of neuronal A_2A adenosinergic receptor (A_2AR) on the physio-pathological development of tauopathy. I study the effect of a selective antagonist of the A_2AR and a specific deletion of neuronal A_2AR on memory, tau pathology and neuroinflammation (reactivity of microglia and astrocytes). 

I am glad to be part of EURON PhD committee and to have the chance to connect, collaborate and exchange with other PhD students thanks to EURON network. As a representative of EURON and the University of Lille, I would like to let other PhD students know about EURON, its network and the great opportunities it offers.

My name is Clémence Delassus, and since October 2024, I have been pursuing a PhD at « Lille Neuroscience and Cognition » research center, within the « Innovative Therapeutics for Brain Diseases (iT4BD) » team. My research focuses on understanding the molecular mechanisms of small anti-Alzheimer molecules, specifically their effect on Tau aggregation its relationship to autophagy.

Through this work, I aim to shed light how these compounds could modulate pathological Tau accumulation and potentially contribute to new therapeutic strategies.
Being part of the EURON PhD committee is a great opportunity to interact with a dynamic and multidisciplinary network of researchers. It allows me to exchange ideas, collaborate across borders, and broaden my scientific perspective. As a representative of the University of Lille within EURON, I’m eager to promote the network and help other PhD students discover the enriching experiences and connections it can offer.

My name is Rabea Schmahl I am a PhD student at the Department of Stereotactic and Functional Neurosurgery at the University of Cologne since March 2024. In my research I focus on imaging methods, in particular I work with tractography to identify connectivity patterns in various neuropsychiatric disorders. I work with imaging form patients who underwent deep brain stimulation (DBS) or lesion surgery. As part of my PhD that focuses on pain patients treated with DBS, I will look at which tracts correlate with our stimulation fields based on patient-specific pain-related S2 regions and how this relates to clinical outcomes. In addition, part of my reserach focuses on aggressive patients who have been treated with ablative surgery, where I will examine whether connectivity patterns can be identified and if they correlate with a positive clinical outcome.

I am happy to be part of Euron as part of my PhD, Euron gives us as young scientists the chance to network and exchange ideas with others in the best possible way.

My name is Yasmine Salman, and since October 2022 I am pursuing a PhD at the Louvain Aging Brain LAB at the University of Louvain. There, I work both with patients at clinical MRI and with post-mortem tissue at ultra-high field MRI to define an MRI signature of tau pathology, especially in Alzheimer's disease. Joining the PhD committee is an exciting opportunity to meet people from different horizons. I would like to encourage people to network and connect with other research groups through the EURON training programs and events.

My name is Marion Dourte and I started my thesis in October 2021 at the University of Louvain (Brussels), in the Aging and Dementia Laboratory. My project, which is also in collaboration with the University of Namur, focuses on brain cellular senescence and its possible role in neurodegenerative diseases such as Alzheimer’s Disease. I am mainly working with a tauopathy mouse model, which is intended to be used for RNA sequencing and proteomic analyses at first. Joining the PhD committee represents a great opportunity for me to meet new people from different universities, to be able to represent my university and finally to promote the Euron workshops."

My name is Elisa Zuccoli and I am PhD student since 2021 in the Developmental and Cellular Biology research group in the LCSB. My PhD project is  focusing on fundamental research on neurodegeneration. My research involves phenotyping of the α-synuclein microglia integrated in healthy and mutant midbrain organoids in Parkinson’s disease, investigating dysfunctional pathways involved in the pathology, and the development of small molecule compounds targeting altered autophagy in PD-specific microglia. Joining the EURON PhD committee allows me to connect with people from different universities who share similar interests. It also provides me with the opportunity to promote the numerous scientific and international benefits of EURON within the University of Luxembourg.

My name is Marijus Giraitis, pursuing my PhD since February 2023 at the University of Luxembourg. Additionally, I work as a clinician-scientist in the Digital Medicine team led by Prof. Dr. med Jochen Klucken at the University of Luxembourg, Luxembourg Institute of Health, and Centre Hospitalier de Luxembourg. In this role, I conduct clinical studies involving Parkinson's patients. My PhD project focuses on designing and developing an electronic diary application tailored to support individuals with Parkinson's in their self-management and assist healthcare professionals in clinical decision-making. I emphasize the implementation of diverse co-creation methods to advance user research and contribute valuable insights to the realm of digital technology in Parkinson's care and research. I am delighted to be a part of EURON and am eager to share information about it with fellow doctoral researchers in Luxembourg.

I started my PhD in February 2024 at the Luxembourg Centre for Systems Biomedicine (LCSB), University of Luxembourg. My research team, Translational Neuroscience contributed to the establishement of a deeply phenotyped Parkinson's disease/parkinsonism cohort of more then 1800 participants. For my PhD, I am using genetic data from our cohort to stratify Parkinson's disease patients according to the individual accumulation of common variants in lysosomal genes, with the help of Polygenic Risk Scores (PRS). I am using iPSC derived neurons from patients with low or high lysosomal PRS to validate the predicted lysosomal impairment, in an effort to demonstrate the potential of translating genetic prediction into more targeted therapeutic treatments. I believe joining Euron as Luxembourg representative can help me connect and collaborate with peers with similar scientific interest and contribute to Euron's promotion and development in Luxembourg.