Centre for Behaviour and Evolution

Staff Profile

Dr Yuki Kikuchi

Lecturer in Sensory, Perceptual and Cognitive Neuroscience

Background

I'm a Lecturer (Assistant Professor) at the Faculty of Medical Sciences and a principal investigator of the Laboratory of Cognitive and Translational Neuroscience at Newcastle University. I obtained my PhD in behavioural neuroscience in Japan and took a post-doc training under the mentorship of Dr Mortimer Mishkin at the Laboratory of Neuropsychology, NIMH/NIH in the USA.

I have +25 years of experience in primate work across four countries (USA, UK, Germany, Japan) and use a variety of neuroscience approaches combined with electrophysiology, fMRI, optogenetics, neuroanatomy, genomics and computational modelling to understand the neural circuits of auditory cognition, aiming to advance treatment and intervention options for mental health and neurological disorders. 

I am a British-Asian scientist from a minority ethnic background and am also a strong advocate for Equality, Diversity and Inclusion (EDI). I actively contribute to outreach events towards greater equality and bringing new possibilities and potentials among typically under-represented people.

Google Scholar

Research Gate

VACANCIES

  • Recruiting several PhD/RA positions at Newcastle University Medical School (Vacancies)




Research

SCIENTIFIC FOCUS

  • Neurobiology and Neural Circuits of Cognition: Advancing Treatment and Interventions for Neurological and Mental Health Disorders


RESEARCH FUNDING


  • 2025-2028 Co-Project Lead on MRC Understanding Public Involvement in Non-clinical Research grant. “Developing resources for public involvement in animal research”
  • 2024-2028 Principal Investigator on BBSRC-NSF/BIO Lead Agency US-UK partnership grant. “Neuronal mechanisms for auditory memory sequencing and prediction" 
  • 2024-2025 Principal Investigator on EPSRC-funded CloseNIT grant. “Closed-loop auditory stimulation to modulate amygdala-frontal synchrony in free-moving marmosets”
  • 2023-2027 Principal Investigator on MRC Programme grant. “Neuronal circuits for perceptual inference” 

 

RESEARCH EXPERIENCES

  • 2019-2020 Guest Researcher. National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH), National Institute of Health (NIH), USA
  • 2007-2011 Georgetown University, Department of Physiology and Biophysics, USA
  • 2007 Max Planck Institute for Biological Cybernetics, Germany
  • 2002-2011 National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH), National Institute of Health (NIH), USA









Teaching


  • MMB 8019 Sensory & Cognitive Neuroscience (Module Leader)
  • BNS 3013 Disorders of the Nervous System
  • PSC 3008 Physiology of the Nervous System


2018 Associate Fellow of the Graduate School, FMS, Newcastle University

Postgraduate and undergraduate project students (>30)

PhD. Supervisor (Biosciences, FMS)


Selected media:


Selected outreach events and lectures:

  • 2024 Holmes Memorial Lecture: Lecture 1: Humans: Can you learn to train your brain? (17 January, 2024)
  • Scent & Science Festival 2023 (1 July, 2023, Featherstone Castle at Haltwhistle, UK, FMS Research Excellence FMS Research Excellence Development Awards (REDA) funded public engagement event)
  • "Gene, Brain and Behaviour: Power of Prediction and Autism Spectrum Disorders" Enrichment Seminars in Psychology, Newcastle University (March 2021)
  • BBC Radio 3: Music Matters: Music in the Time of Our Lives (17-18 March, 2017)
  • Meet the Neuroscientist: Great Exhibition of the North (Great North Museum, 24 August, 2018)
  • Brain Awareness Week: Palace of Science (Wylam Brewery, 12 March, 2019)
  • European Researchers Night: Supported by the European Commission as a part of the Marie Sklodowska-Curie Actions, funded under the Horizon 2020 programme (Great North Museum, 28 September, 2018)
  • "Rhythmic Brain. How rhythms can help our perception and learning?": Joseph Cowen Lifelong Learning Centre, Newcastle upon Tyne, UK. (June 2017)
  • "Music, Language, Syntax? Sequence Learning and Neurological Disorders": Joseph Cowen Lifelong Learning Centre, Newcastle upon Tyne, UK. (Dec 2016)
  • "Rhythms of your brain. Keys to train your brain through sounds": Joseph Cowen Lifelong Learning Centre, Newcastle upon Tyne, UK. (January 2016)
  • "Is Music Just for Us? Searching for the origins of musicality through neural symphony": Joseph Cowen Lifelong Learning Centre, Newcastle upon Tyne, UK. (May - June 2016)
  • "Interaction between cortical responses and natural sounds in the primate auditory system using MRI-guided electrophysiology'': Leibniz Institute for Neurobiology, Magdeburg, Germany (June 2013)
  • "Human Brain Function and Behaviour": Kyoto University, Graduate School of Engineering, Japan. Neuroscience, Mental Health (Summer course, 2013)

Publications