Koya Ensemble Lab

People

PI: Eisuke (ace ke´) Koya, Professor in Behavioural Neuroscience 

I grew up in sunny Orange County California. I obtained my BA in Neurobiology at the University of California at Berkeley. Afterwards, I received my PhD under the mentorship of Profs. Taco De Vries and Guus Smit at the Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam in The Netherlands. I investigated immediate early gene (IEG) expression patterns in corticostriatal brain areas during cue-induced drug and natural reward seeking behaviours using tools such as real-time quantitative PCR. 

I returned to the US to conduct my post-doctoral research at the National Institute on Drug Abuse Intramural Research Programme (NIDA IRP, Baltimore USA) under the mentorship of Drs. Yavin Shaham, Bruce Hope, and Carl Lupica. During this time, I investigated how sparse sets of activated neurons or 'neuronal ensembles' mediated learned associations between drug effects and the drug administration context and underwent unique synaptic adaptations. In 2012, I joined the School of Psychology as a Lecturer (assistant professor) and was promoted to Professor in 2024. Since 2024, I have been a visiting Research Collaborator at Mayo Clinic, (Rochester, MN, USA). I am interested in how neuronal ensembles in motivationally-relevant brain areas such as the nucleus accumbens and prefrontal cortex, establish, maintain, and update appetitive associations between food rewards and the cues that predict their availability.

Current lab members: 

  • Zuzana Pedan-BBSRC funded Post doc
  • Scott Kinghorn-BBSRC funded Research Technician
  • Emily Woods-BBSRC SoCoBio Doctoral Training Program PhD student  

Collaborators:

  • Nobuyoshi Suto (Mayo Clinic, USA)

Former lab members:

  • Louise Jones (Laboratory intern 2014-2015)
  • Jowinn Chew (JRA summer 2015, Psychology class of '16)
  • Anastasia Macnaghten (Neuroscience-MRes student, class of '16)
  • Sabine Hessler (Research Fellow 2015-2016; Post-doc University of Otago)
  • Hayley Reeve (MRC funded Research Technician, 2016; PhD student University of Bristol)
  • Gabriella Margetts-Smith (BBSRC funded)-Research Technician (2015-2018, PhD student University of Exeter)
  • Joseph Ziminski (BBSRC funded)-Research Fellow (2017-2018, Post-doc, University of Cambridge)
  • Meike Sieburg (Sussex Neuroscience 4-Year PhD programme)-PhD student (2015-2018, Post-doc, University of Aarhus)
  • Leonie Brebner (Sussex Neuroscience 4-Year PhD programme)-PhD student (2016-2019, JSPS Research Fellow, University of Tokyo)
  • Letitia McMullan (SoCoBio DTP)-PhD Rotation student (Spring 2021)
  • Larisa Gheorgiu (SoCoBio DTP)-PhD Rotation student (Autumn 2022)
  • Kate Peters (MRC funded)-Research Fellow (2021-2023, now Leverhulme Early Career Fellow, University of Sussex)
  • Jacopo Modoni (Leverhulme funded)-PhD student (2019-2022, professional training in psychotherapy)
  • Romarua Agbude (MRC funded)-Research Technician (2021-2023, now technician in Prof. Jamie Ward lab, University of Sussex)
  • Nupur Mahadeokar (MRC funded)- Research Technician (2023, now PhD student at Beroun lab, Nencki Institue, Poland)