Agatha Alves Anet

Ágatha completed her BSc in Biomedical Sciences in Brazil, where she investigated the neuromodulation of neuropathic pain and the encoding of fear memory (the latter was part of her year at Collège de France). These experiences sparked her interest in understanding the subjectiveness of pain and fear, and how mental well-being can affect them. In her final year, Ágatha did an internship delivering cognitive training to promote brain health in older adults and Schizophrenia patients, consolidating her desire to study mental health.

She completed her MRes in Brain Sciences at UCL, writing a thesis on the cognitive mechanisms of catastrophising, and subsequently worked as a part-time Research Assistant at the University of Cambridge analysing brain images. Before starting her PhD, Ágatha became a full-time Research Assistant at the Sainsbury Wellcome Centre, training mice in behavioural tasks. She hopes to take advantage of these translational research experiences to do a multi-disciplinary PhD project.

Ágatha is particularly eager to understand the mechanisms of Mental Illness, especially anxiety and depression, using computational models of behaviour. Alongside her research, she aims to find effective ways of combatting mental illness stigmas. In the past, Ágatha has volunteered in public engagement initiatives teaching neuroscience in low-income schools and during her PhD she wants continue to promote accessible, reproducible and transparent science. During her Masters, together with the charity Rethink Mental Illness, she has developed workshops aimed to teaching students tools to cope with challenges they face at University