Staff Profile

I joined the School of Psychology at Newcastle University on September 1st, 2021 as Lecturer. Prior to that I worked as Senior Research Fellow at the Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience (UCL). I obtained my PhD in neuroscience from the École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL, 2013, Switzerland) and a MSc in Physics from Heidelberg University (2007, Germany).

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My research is focused on the neural mechanisms underlying spatial memory and navigation, as well as the related functions of the medial temporal lobe in episodic memory, future thinking and visuo-spatial imagery. I am particularly interested in how behavior and cognition can be related to mechanistic computational models and how these ideas can be tested with behavioral experiments and in clinical settings. Other topics of interest include motor pattern generation and large-scale brain models.

Undergraduate Teaching

For 2021/2022 I contribute to modules PSY1007, PSY1010, PSY2008, and PSY2014. 

• Yan Y, Burgess N, Bicanski A. A model of head direction and landmark coding in complex environments. PLoS Computational Biology 2021, 17(9), e1009434.
• Edvardsen V, Bicanski A, Burgess N. Navigating with grid and place cells in cluttered environments. Hippocampus 2020, 30(3), 220-232.
• Bicanski A, Burgess N. Neuronal vector coding in spatial cognition. Nature Reviews Neuroscience 2020, 21, 453-470.
• Bicanski A, Burgess N. A computational model of recognition memory via grid cells. Current Biology 2019, 29(6), 979-990.e4.
• Bicanski A, Burgess N. A neural-level model of spatial memory and imagery. eLife 2018, 7, 33752.
• Bicanski A, Burgess N. Environmental anchoring of head direction in a computational model of retrosplenial cortex. The Journal of Neuroscience 2016, 36(46), 11601-11618.
• Evans T, Bicanski A, Bush D, Burgess N. How environment and self‐motion combine in neural representations of space. The Journal of Physiology 2016, 594(22), 6535-6546.
• Ijspeert AJ, Bicanski A, Knuesel J, Cabelguen J-M. Motor Pattern Generation. In: Arbib, MA; Bonaiuto, J, ed. From Neuron to Cognition via Computational Neuroscience. MIT Press, 2016, pp.251-284.
• Knuesel J, Bicanski A, Ryczko D, Cabelguen JM, Ijspeert AJ. A salamander’s flexible spinal network for locomotion, modeled at two levels of abstraction. Integrative and comparative biology 2013.
• Bicanski A, Ryczko D, Knuesel J, Harischandra N, Charrier V, Ekeberg Ö, Cabelguen JM, Ijspeert AJ. Decoding the mechanisms of gait generation in salamanders by combining neurobiology, modeling and robotics. Biological Cybernetics 2013.
• Bicanski A, Ryczko D, Cabelguen JM, Ijspeert AJ. From lamprey to salamander: an exploratory modeling study on the architecture of the spinal locomotor networks in the salamander. Biological Cybernetics 2013.
• Harischandra N, Knuesel J, Kozlov A, Bicanski A, Cabelguen JM, Ijspeert AJ, Ekeberg Ö. Sensory feedback plays a significant role in generating walking gait and in gait transition in salamanders: a simulation study. Frontiers in neurorobotics 2011.