Annalisa Paolino

I am a passionate neuroscientist, working as a Postdoctoral Researcher at the School of Biomedical Sciences (SBMS, UQ).

I have always had a deep interest in Medicine and Biology, which brought me to first successfully complete a bachelor degree in Medicine and Surgery in 2013 (University of Insubria, Italy), and then a PhD in Neuroscience in 2019 (Queensland Brain Institute, QBI, UQ). My PhD investigated how the connections of the cerebral cortex develop and evolve in different animal species, with a specific focus on the plasticity of these connections in health and disease.

During my first Postdoctoral experience in the laboratories of Dr Opazo and A/Prof Anggono (QBI, UQ), I worked on a project involving cutting-edge live-cell imaging using a two-photon microscope to investigate how key molecules are distributed in the brain during neuronal plasticity, both in vitro and in vivo, followed by behavioural assays.

Thanks to this experience, I gained unique surgical, behavioural, and imaging expertise that I am now employing to answer questions of brain evolution and development in the laboratories of Dr Fenlon and A/Prof Suárez at SBMS. In my current position I am investigating how the different timing (heterochrony) of developmental processes in brain development can cause dramatic changes in the final brain structure, both in the context of evolution as well as disease.