5.22.24
Jasmine Pathan
Lisa Genzel
Lisa Genzel’s Neuroscience Journey and the FENS-Kavli Network’s Decade of Influence
Inspired by an unusual blend of influences — including a fascination with Oliver Sacks’ enigmatic narratives — Lisa Genzel, a scientist at Radboud University in the Netherlands, revolutionizes memory neuroscience. As chair of the FENS-Kavli Network (2024-2026), Genzel shares her vision for basic science funding and interdisciplinary collaboration.
“It started with a classic Oliver Sacks-inspired love for neurology as a teenager,” reminisces Genzel. From early explorations in a high school thesis delving into the minds of serial killers to her pursuit of medical studies, Genzel’s fascination with “the weird brain” deepened.
While at the Max Planck Institute for Psychiatry in Germany, Genzel explored sleep research for her medical thesis due to her life-long struggle with insomnia. Genzel fell in love with the field, realizing sleep’s significant role in memory consolidation: “It’s not just us lying there,” Genzel mused, “Sleep really does something.”
The works of Dr. Adrien Peyrache and Dr. Richard Morris profoundly influenced Genzel’s research trajectory. Inspired by Peyrache’s investigations into sleep spindles and neural activity in rodents, Genzel shifted from studying slumber in humans to gain insights into sleep and memory consolidation in animal models. At The University of Edinburgh in Scotland, Morris’s work elucidating the impact of prior knowledge on memory spurred Genzel to developing novel rodent behavioral tasks to probe memory mechanisms.
Genzel’s groundbreaking research at Radboud University challenges a long-standing hypothesis in memory systems. Genzel explains that the brain has two memory systems: the fast-learning hippocampus and the slow-learning cortex. The field has long theorized that the cortex preserves memories while the hippocampus encodes new experiences without replacing old ones. Genzel’s team tested this hypothesis by combining electrophysiology, novel behavioral tasks, and a molecular intervention that increases cortical plasticity. This work demonstrated that it is possible to transform a slow learner into a fast learner by increasing plasticity. The result is an improved learning experience – albeit at the cost of overwriting preexisting knowledge.
As the current FENS-Kavli Network (FKNE) chair, Genzel’s passion for discovery influences her leadership. “The heart of FKNE’s mission lies in a dedication to fundamental inquiry,” says Genzel, emphasizing her commitment to preserving resources for basic science to address fundamental questions in neuroscience. She envisions a future of neuroscience research that “embrace[s] complexity and difficulty, not simplicity.”
“FKNE has supported transformative impact for a decade, and we’re thrilled to recognize this milestone at the 2024 FENS Forum,” said Dr. Stephanie Albin, program officer at The Kavli Foundation. “We look forward to ongoing growth and evolution that Lisa Genzel’s leadership will bring to the network, and ultimately to new advances in neuroscience.”
Reflecting on the FKNE’s 10th anniversary, Genzel highlights some of the network’s achievements, saying, “The network has done a lot to give back to the community.” She highlights the role that FKNE has had in developing future leaders, with former scholars taking on key roles in European neuroscience communities and promoting collaboration. “It’s all about building a community,” Genzel emphasizes, encapsulating the essence of FKNE’s mission.
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The Kavli Foundation based in Oxnard, California is dedicated to the goals of advancing science for the benefit of humanity and promoting increased public understanding and support for scientists and their work.
The Foundation’s mission is implemented through an international program of research institutes; professorships; and symposia in the fields of astrophysics; nanoscience; neuroscience; and theoretical physics as well as prizes in the fields of astrophysics; nanoscience; and neuroscience.
The Kavli Foundation was established in December 2000 by its founder and benefactor Fred Kavli a Norwegian business leader and philanthropist who made his money by creating Kavlico- a company that made sensors; and by investing in real estate in southern California and Nevada. David Auston, a former president of Case Western Reserve University and former Bell Labs scientist, was the first president of the Kavli Foundation and is largely credited with the vision of the scientific investments. Kavli died in 2013 and his foundation is currently actively involved in establishing research institutes at universities throughout the United States, in Europe, and in Asia.
To date, the Kavli Foundation has made grants to establish Kavli Institutes on the campuses of 16 major universities. In addition to the Kavli Institutes, six Kavli professorships have been established: two at University of California-Santa Barbara, one each at University of California-Los Angeles, University of California-Irvine, Columbia University, Cornell University, and California Institute of Technology.
The Kavli Institutes
Astrophysics
The Kavli Institute for Particle Astrophysics and Cosmology at Stanford University
The Kavli Institute for Cosmological Physics, University of Chicago
The Kavli Institute for Astrophysics and Space Research at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology
The Kavli Institute for Astronomy and Astrophysics at The Peking University [北京大学](CN)
The Kavli Institute for Cosmology at The University of Cambridge (UK)
The Kavli Institute for the Physics and Mathematics of the Universe at The University of Tokyo[(東京大] (JP)
Nanoscience
The Kavli Institute for Nanoscale Science at Cornell University
The Kavli Institute of Nanoscience at The Delft University of Technology [Technische Universiteit Delft](NL)
The Kavli Nanoscience Institute at The California Institute of Technology
The Kavli Institute for Bionano Science and Technology at Harvard University
The Kavli Energy NanoSciences Institute at The University of California-Berkeley and The DOE’s Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory
Neuroscience
The Kavli Institute for Brain Science at Columbia University
The Kavli Institute for Brain & Mind at The University of California-San Diego
The Kavli Institute for Neuroscience at Yale University
The Kavli Institute for Systems Neuroscience at The Norwegian University of Science and Technology [Norges teknisk-naturvitenskapelige universitet](NO)
The Kavli Neuroscience Discovery Institute at The Johns Hopkins University
The Kavli Neural Systems Institute at The Rockefeller University
The Kavli Institute for Fundamental Neuroscience at The University of California-San Francisco
Theoretical physics
Kavli Institute for Theoretical Physics at The University of California-Santa Barbara
The Kavli Institute for Theoretical Physics China at The Chinese Academy of Sciences [中国科学院](CN)