Members — Harnett Lab at MIT

ASSOCIATE PROFESSOR & GRADUATE OFFICER | DEPARTMENT OF BRAIN & COGNITIVE SCIENCES

INVESTIGATOR | MCGOVERN INSTITUTE FOR BRAIN RESEARCH

Mark joined the faculty at MIT in 2015 and was promoted to professor with tenure in 2023. He became Graduate Officer in 2021. He received his B.A. in Biology from Reed College in Portland, Oregon and his Ph.D. from the University of Texas at Austin. Prior to joining MIT, he was a postdoctoral researcher at the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Janelia Research Campus in Ashburn VA.

46-6143A | 617.324.6989 | harnett at mit dot edu

Research Scientists & Postdocs

Courtney Yaeger (She/Her), Ph.D | Postdoctoral Fellow

Courtney joined the lab in January of 2019. She received her B.S. in Neuroscience (Independent Plan of Study) from the University of Illinois and her Ph.D. in Neuroscience from the University of California, Los Angeles. Courtney is an LSRF fellow.
yaeger at mit dot edu
Valerio Francioni (He/Him), Ph.D. | Postdoctoral Fellow

Valerio joined the lab in March 2020. Valerio received his B.Sc. in Neuroscience and his Ph.D. in Integrative Physiology at the University of Edinburgh, UK. Valerio is a Y. Eva Tan postdoctoral fellow.
valeriof at mit dot edu
Chunyan Wu (She/Her), Ph.D | Postdoctoral Associate

Chunyan joined the lab in October of 2021. She received her B.S. in Bioengineering from the Hefei University of Technology in China, her M.Eng. in Biomedical Engineering and her Ph.D. in Biomedical Sciences from Cornell University.
cw674 at mit dot edu

Graduate Students

Vincent Tang | BCS Graduate StudentVincent joined MIT in 2019, then joined the Harnett lab as a second year graduate student. He received a B.A. in Neuroscience from Princeton Universityvdtang at mit dot edu — **Vincent Tang (He/Him) | BCS Graduate Student**
Vincent joined MIT in 2019, then joined the Harnett lab as a second year graduate student. He received a B.A. in Neuroscience from Princeton University
*vdtang at mit dot edu*

Mila Halgren (She/Her) | BCS Graduate Student

Mila joined the lab in February of 2020. She received her B.A. in Computational Neuroscience from University of California, San Diego. Before graduate school she worked as a research technician in Prof. Sydney Cash’s Lab at Massachusetts General Hospital. Mila is an MIT Presidential Fellow and a Holcombe Sharp Graduate Student Fellow.

mhalgren at mit dot edu

Quique Toloza (He/Him) | MSTP/Physics Graduate Student

Quique joined the lab in 2016 for an MSRP summer project and returned as a research technician in 2017. In 2018, he entered the Harvard/MIT M.D.-Ph.D. program and, in August of 2020, he (officially) joined the lab as a graduate student in the Department of Physics at MIT. He received his B.S. in Physics and Spanish Literature from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Quique is a Harvard Presidential Scholar, a Paul & Daisy Soros Fellow, and a K. Lisa Yang ICoN Graduate Student Fellow.

qtoloza at mit dot edu

Gabriela Rasch (She/Her) | BCS Graduate Student

Gaby joined the lab in April 2022. she received her B.S. in Biomedical Engineering with a minor in psychology from Florida International University in Miami, FL.

grasch at mit dot edu

Raúl Mojica Soto-Albors (He/Him) | BCS Graduate Student

Raul first joined in the lab in June 2017 as part of MSRP, and returned in February 2018 as a Visiting Scholar. He came back to MIT for graduate school, and officially joined the lab in May 2020. He received his B.S. in Biology from the University of Puerto Rico at Mayagüez.

rmojica at mit dot edu

Staff

Alexa Breidinger (She/Her) | Laboratory Administrator
Alexa came to MIT in 2016 before joining the Harnett lab in July of 2018. She received her B.S. in Psychology from the University of Dayton and her M.S.W. from the University of Akron.
abreid at mit dot edu
Trang Pham (She/Her) | Research Technician
Trang joined the lab in June of 2021. She received her B.A. in Biochemistry and Mathematics from Mount Holyoke College.
trangp at mit dot edu
Anna Beltramini (She/Her) | Research Technician
Anna joined the lab in July 2022. She earned her B.S. in Neuroscience from SUNY Geneseo and her Master of Research in Fundamental Neuroscience from Maastricht University in the Netherlands.
Annalb at mit dot edu
Shang Gao (Gale) (He/Him) | Research Technician
Shang joined the lab in July 2023. He received his Bachelor's degree in Opto-physics and Engineering from the Changchun University of Science and Technology. He graduated from Carnegie Mellon University with Master's Degree, majoring in Biomedical Engineering, with a research track in Neural Computation.
shang111 at mit dot edu
Claire Duan (She/Her) | Research Technician
Claire joined the lab in October 2023. She received her B.A. in Biology (Neurobiology and Behavior & Computational Biology) with a minor in music from Cornell University.
clairekd at mit dot edu

Alumni

Derrick Barnagian | Research Technician, 2015-2018
Vardhan Dani, Ph.D | Research Scientist, 2015-2017
Olga Vieira | Lab Administrator 2015-2018

Marissa Hansen | Postbaccalaureate Research Scholar, 2018-2019
Mathieu Lafourcade | Postdoctoral Associate, 2015-2020
Lou Beaulieu-Laroche Ph.D | Graduate Student, 2016-2021

Nicholas Miller | Research Technician, 2019-2021
Lukas Fischer, Ph.D | Research Scientist, 2015 - 2022
Jakob Voigts, Ph.D. | Postdoctoral Associate, 2016-2022

Link to his new lab!
https://www.voigtslab.org/
Marie-Sophie Helene Van der Goes, Ph.D | Graduate Student, 2016-2022
Norma Brown | Research Technician, 2018-2023
Dimitra Vardalaki Ph.D | Graduate Student, 2019-2023
Jaeyoung Yoon, Ph.D | Postdoctoral Associate, 2019-2023
Julia Dziubek | Graduate Student, 2022-2023