Afik Faerman

Postdoctoral Research Fellow

Afik is a clinical neuropsychology postdoctoral scholar and an incoming NIMH T32 fellow. He completed his clinical training at the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF) and Baylor College of Medicine and earned his Ph.D. in clinical psychology with emphasis in neuropsychology from Palo Alto University. His research centers on modulation of consciousness and its clinical utilities. Currently, Afik is studying the mechanisms theough which interventional approaches such as using hypnosis, psychedelics, and brain stimulation lead to alterations in conscious expereinces, and how they can be leveragaed to improve performance and clinical outcomes. His work has been acknowledged and supported by the American Psychological Association (APA), the Sleep Research Society (SRS), the Society for Clinical and Experimental Hypnosis (SCEH), the American Society for Clinical Hypnosis (ASCH), and more. He serves as the current Membership of the American Psychological Association Division 30 (Psychological Hypnosis) and past chair of the Student Committee at the Association for the Scientific Study of Consciousness (ASSC).

Bora Kim

Postdoctoral Research Fellow

Dr. Kim is a research track resident at UCSF and holds a combined position as a Postdoctoral Scholar in the Department of Psychiatry & Behavioral Sciences and Brain Stimulation Lab at Stanford University.

Her clinical interests revolve around the treatment of resistant conditions in psychiatric disorders, with a particular focus on treatment-resistant depression and suicide intervention. Presently, her research is dedicated to the development of interventions for suicidality and treatment-resistant depression using rapid-acting neuromodulation techniques.Before embarking on her second residency as a research track resident at UCSF and her postdoctoral position at Stanford University, Dr. Kim obtained board certification as a psychiatrist in South Korea. Her previous research endeavors have primarily centered on identifying risk factors associated with suicidal behaviors and formulating suicide prevention models. She has published several papers on these topics. Dr. Kim’s goal is to further advance the field by developing rapid-acting neuromodulation techniques at the Brain Stimulation Lab to address suicidality and alleviate symptoms of treatment-resistant depression. Currently, her primary involvement lies in projects that apply accelerated transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) to treat individuals with treatment-resistant bipolar depression and borderline personality disorder.

Chris Austelle

Postdoctoral Research Fellow

Chris Austelle joined the Stanford Brain Stimulation Lab in July 2023 after completing psychiatry residency at the Medical University of South Carolina (MUSC). Chris started working in the Brain Stimulation Lab at MUSC during his undergraduate years at College of Charleston and continued during medical school and residency. During residency, he completed the Diversity in Addiction Research Training (DART) program research track mentored by Dr Mark George. Chris has worked with a variety of brain stimulation modalities, including transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS), transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS), transcutaneous auricular vagus nerve stimulation (taVNS), trigeminal nerve stimulation (TNS), and low intensity focused ultrasound pulsation (LIFUP). His most recent work focused on modulation of autonomic and stress responses using taVNS. In his free time, Chris likes to read and be outdoors.

Derrick Buchanan

Postdoctoral Research Fellow

Dr. Buchanan is a PhD Clinical Neuroscientist originally from Ottawa, Canada. Dr. Buchanan’s has worked in the field of Neuropsychiatry and Clinical Neuroscience for seven years, with a particular focus on such conditions as attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, major depression disorder, brain injury, and chronic pain.

During his PhD Dr. Buchanan primarily worked in the Neuroscience of Imagination Cognition Emotion Research Lab at Carleton University, and the Neuropsychiatry Lab at the Children’s Hospital of Eastern Ontario. Dr. Buchanan also spent five years in Canada as the Director of Research/Manager of the Brain Clinic at a private medical centre in Ottawa called the Seekers Centre.

In addition to his research background, Dr. Buchanan also has extensive clinical experience working with hundreds of patients using brain stimulation techniques such as transcranial direct current stimulation, and neuroimaging such as electroencephalography and event related potentials. Dr. Buchanan was, and remains, interested in using neuroimaging and machine learning to generate models/phenotypes of neuropsychiatric diseases to derive more efficacious individualized brain stimulation treatment protocols.

Dr. Buchanan has also taught nearly a dozen courses at Carleton University since 2016 including 4th year seminars on Neuropsychiatry / Clinical Neuroscience, and the first year introduction to Neuropsychiatry course.

At Stanford, Dr. Buchanan is primarily focussed on running a large scale multisite clinical trial utilizing functional magnetic resonance imaging, and transcranial magnetic stimulation to individualize treatment protocols for patients with treatment resistant depression. In his own words, it is Dr. Buchanan’s job to “Make people happy”!

Igor Dorea Bandeira

Postdoctoral Research Fellow

Igor D. Bandeira, M.D., is a physician-scientist from Salvador in Brazil working as a Postdoctoral Research Fellow in the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences at Stanford University.

He completed his Doctor of Medicine (M.D.) at the Federal University of Bahia (Brazil), where he received the prestigious Professor Alfredo Thomé de Britto Award for outstanding graduate scientific research. Part of his medical training took place at the University of Sydney (Australia) through a Science Without Borders Scholarship.

In parallel with his formal graduate training, he worked as a researcher at the university’s Brain and Mind Centre during this period. Dr. Bandeira acquired further clinical experience at the Brazilian Ministry of Health as an attending physician, where he worked for over three years in primary care and mental health interventions within the framework of the national healthcare strategy for vulnerable populations in areas with a shortage of professionals. Furthermore, during the pandemic, Dr. Bandeira worked on the Brazilian frontline in the fight against Covid-19.

In respect of research, he has several years’ experience applying noninvasive brain stimulation techniques in the fields of neurology and psychiatry, and most notably in the treatment of neurodevelopmental disorders.

Since starting his Ph.D. in Neuroscience at the Federal University of Bahia in 2019, Dr. Bandeira has also acquired expertise in developing clinical trials to test the efficacy of rapid-acting antidepressants. His work involved using Ketamine and its enantiomers (e.g., Esketamine and Arketamine) for treatment-resistant mental disorders.

Jen Lissemore

Postdoctoral Research Fellow

Jen completed her BSc and MSc studying psychology and neuroscience at McGill University in Montreal. Her research at McGill spanned rodent behavioral neuroscience and human neuroimaging. For example, she used positron emission tomography (PET) to study how serotonin and dopamine are involved in obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) and related learning processes. Jen then completed her PhD in neuroscience at the University of Toronto. Her PhD focused on using non-invasive human neurophysiology techniques (TMS-electromyography and TMS-electroencephalography/EEG) to study the neuropathology and treatment of depression across the lifespan.

Jen has since joined the BSL as a postdoctoral researcher, and is excited to be investigating how new brain stimulation protocols may improve the treatment of OCD, and how biological measures of brain functioning could help to refine and personalize these brain stimulation treatments for OCD. Ultimately, Jen’s mission is to advance how well we understand and treat disorders of ‘stopping’.

Martin Tik

Postdoctoral Research Fellow

Dr. Tik is a postdoctoral scholar from Vienna, Austria. He has a background in Biological Psychology and Medical Physics and experience in highly interdisciplinary experimental research. During his academic career, he used brain imaging and stimulation methods to gain insights into pathways related to insightful problem solving as well as emotion processing. Through collaboration between the Medical University of Vienna and international partners, he could further identify connectivity changes linked to affective disorders and treatment.

Specifically, Dr. Tik has developed new techniques to better combine Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation with functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging to measure induced activation changes as they happen.

Dr. Tik recently joined the Stanford Brain Stimulation Laboratory team to translate these research tools into clinical applications aiming to optimize important stimulation parameters for tailoring transcranial magnetic stimulation to individual patient’s needs.

Masataka Wada

Postdoctoral Research Fellow

Dr. Wada is a postdoctoral scholar in the Department of Psychiatry & Behavioral Sciences at the Stanford University School of Medicine. He is a board-certified psychiatrist and holds a PhD in neuroscience.

His clinical and research interests center on psychiatric disorders in treatment-resistant conditions. To address these challenges, Dr. Wada is engaged in exploring electrophysiological, neuroimaging, and neuromodulation techniques, including repetitive Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation (rTMS) and Deep Brain Stimulation (DBS). He spearheaded a significant Randomized Controlled Trial (RCT) that involved 180 patients with treatment-resistant depression, aiming to develop an innovative rTMS-based treatment. His efforts have led to him receiving awards at international conferences on three occasions for his significant contributions.

Dr. Wada’s scholarly work includes publications on the electrophysiological characteristics of psychiatric disorders and the effects of neuromodulation on clinical symptoms and neuroimaging features. Additionally, he has been the recipient of two scholarships and three grants, further highlighting his contributions to the field.

Wiebke Struckmann

Postdoctoral Research Fellow

Dr. Struckmann earned her B.Sc. and M.Sc. degrees in Psychology from the University of Jena in Germany, followed by a PhD in Clinical Neuroscience from Uppsala University in Sweden. Throughout her doctoral studies, Dr. Struckmann used functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) and functional near-infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS) in a neuroimaging-guided clinical trial assessing the effectiveness of transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) targeting the dorsomedial prefrontal cortex to alleviate anhedonia in individuals with depression and schizophrenia.

Dr. Struckmann joined the Stanford Brain Stimulation Lab as a postdoctoral research fellow in September 2022. Presently, she leads a clinical trial examining personalized therapeutic neuromodulation for anhedonic depression. Driven by her passion for innovative research methodologies, Dr. Struckmann incorporates personalized task designs and physiological assessments to untangle the intricate relationships between cognition, emotion, and psychiatric symptoms, extending her investigations to include obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) and addiction. Dr. Struckmann’s primary objective is to advance both our comprehension and treatment of mental health conditions through probing target networks in the brain.