Group Members
Alexander Mathis, PhD | Assistant Professor
Our work strives to understand how the brain creates complex behavior. We develop tools for measuring of behavior to achieve that goal, while making sure that they are broadly accessible to the community. Furthermore, we make models and theories to elucidate how the brain gives rise to behavior with a specific focus on motor control and sensorimotor learning. Measuring behavior is key for assessing and constraining these models.
Bio: Diplom in Mathematics and PhD with Prof. Andreas Herz (Ludwig-Maximilians-University Munich) | Postdoc with Prof. Venkatesh N. Murthy (Harvard University) and Prof. Matthias Bethge (Tuebingen AI).
Contact: alexander.mathis@epfl.ch | google scholar & GitHub | address, telephone et al.
Current Lab Members
project: 3D pose estimation & modeling humans
Valentin Gabeff (PhD student)
co-supervised with Prof. Devis Tuia
project: WildAI
Sepideh Mamooler (PhD student)
co-supervised with Prof. Antoine Bosselut
project: Behavior understanding with NLP
project: measuring naturalistic human behavior and linking it to brain function
Merkourios Simos (PhD Student)
project: proprioception, sensorimotor control and learning
Chengkun Li (PhD student)
project: reinforcement learning
Bianca Ziliotto (PhD student)
project: proprioception and sensorimotor control
Matea Tashkovska (PhD student)
project: quantifying behavior
project: modeling hierarchy
Laura Bock (ETH Zurich - EPFL Joint Doctoral Program in the Learning Sciences)
co-supervised with Prof. Manu Kapoor
project: productive failure
We also host internal and external Bachelor as well as Master’s project students. Here we only list full time lab members.
Former PhD students
Lucas Stoffl (PhD Student)
project: behavioral analysis
Graduated in spring 2025 and went to Cornell Weill for a postdoc!
Alessandro Marin Vargas (PhD Student)
project: modeling the sensorimotor pathway
Graduated in spring 2025 and went to Stanford for a postdoc!
project: reinforcement learning for motor control
Graduated in the spring of 2025 and went to Flexion Robotics!
project: pose estimation and ReID
Graduate in the fall of 2025 and went to the Zoo in Zurich!
Other alumni
Adriana Perez Rotondo (Postdoctoral Fellow)
project: modeling and theory for sensorimotor circuits
Maxim Pavliv (Software Engineer)
project: all things software, incl. DeepLabCut; also in M.W.Mathis lab
Niels Poulsen (Software Engineer)
project: all things software; also in M.W.Mathis lab
(Selected) past and present collaborators:
Prof. Mackenzie Mathis (EPFL)
Prof. Michael Dimitriou (Umea)
Prof. Catherine Dulac (Harvard)
Prof. Friedhelm Hummel (EPFL)
Marc Pollefeys (ETH)
Prof. Lee Miller (Northwestern University)
TBA