Meet The Team
Principal Investigator
Dr. Taylor Abel is a pediatric neurosurgeon and Assistant Professor of Neurological Surgery and Bioengineering at the University of Pittsburgh. He specializes in surgery for epilepsy, brain tumors, and movement disorders. His research examines how normal and abnormal processing of voice and other auditory signals in the human brain. His other central interest is optimization and development of novel surgical therapies for epilepsy.
Taylor Abel, MD
Postdoctoral Research Fellows
Kyle earned his PhD from Johns Hopkins University where he worked to identify cortical representations of both visual semantics and speech acoustics under the supervision of Dr. Nathan Crone. As a postdoctoral associate, his current work focuses on studying auditory and speech processing in human cortex using invasive intracortical recording techniques.
Kyle Rupp, PhD
Vibha Viswanathan is a postdoctoral researcher jointly in the labs of Drs. Taylor Abel and Lori Holt (CMU). She received her Ph.D. in Biomedical Engineering from Purdue University, and her B.E. and M.S. in Electrical Engineering from Anna University (India) and the University of Michigan (Ann Arbor), respectively. Vibha's research uses a combination of electroencephalography, stereo-electroencephalography, psychophysics, and computational modeling to investigate how the human brain encodes speech in complex acoustic scenes, how this encoding maps to perception, and how it flexibly adapts to regularities in the input speech and to any changes in the scene statistics. She also develops statistical and signal processing methods for neuroscience.
Vibha Viswanathan, PhD
Lab Manager
Hope Reecher, BS
Research Coordinator
Emily received her bachelor of arts in Communication Science & Disorders and her master of arts in Speech-Language Pathology from the University of Pittsburgh. Prior to joining the lab, she worked as an SLP providing treatment to children with complex communication needs. Emily previously worked under the direction of Dr. Connie Tompkins at Pitt, studying discourse comprehension and semantic network activation in patients with right-hemisphere brain injury.
Emily Harford, BA MA
Medical Students
Nallammai is a fourth year medical student at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine and is currently a scholar through the Clinical Scientist Training Program. Her primary research interests are 1) clinical outcomes for pediatric patients who undergo neurosurgical treatments (i.e., vagus nerve stimulation) for drug-resistant epilepsy and 2) preoperative factors which may predict response to such treatments. Outside of research, she serves as the Mentorship Coordinator for the Association of Women Surgeons National Medical Student Committee, loves running long-distance, and enjoys playing clarinet.
Nallammai Muthiah, BS - MS4 (CSTP)
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Kanupriya is a medical student in the Physician-Scientist Training Program at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine. She graduated from Wellesley College in 2018 where she received a bachelors of arts in neuroscience. After graduation, Kanupriya spent a year working in the BIEN Lab at Vanderbilt University under the direction of Dr. Dario Englot. Her research interests include resting-state brain connectivity in patients with epilepsy.
Kanupriya Gupta, BA - Research Year (PSTP)
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Madi is a second-year medical student at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine. She earned her bachelors of science in neuroscience at the University of Michigan and received her masters in biomedical sciences at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine. Madi's research focuses on understanding the role of stereoelectroencephalography and subdural electrodes in invasive monitoring for patients with medically intractable epilepsy
Madison Remick, BS, MS - MS2
Jasmine Hect, BS - G1
Kendall Curtis, MS1
Lab Alumni
Emefa Akwayena, BS
Emefa was the previous lab manager/ research coordinator for the PBE Lab. She is now a Ph.D. student studying Cognitive Neuroscience at Carnegie Mellon University.
Dylan was a postdoctoral research fellow in the PBEL. He received his PhD in Bioengineering from the University of Pittsburgh, where he worked in human clinical trials focused on intracortical brain-computer interfaces and sensorimotor control. Dylan's research was focused on analyzing intracranial EEG recordings in pediatric epilepsy patients to study auditory processing and human voice recognition.
Dylan Royston, PhD
Akanksha is a medical student in the Physician Scientist Training Program at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine. She majored in Neuroscience and Biochemistry at the University of Iowa where she worked with Dr. Hanna Stevens studying preeclampsia, a gestational disorder, and its neurodevelopmental effects on offspring.
Akanksha Chilukuri, BS
Brigit was a student researcher in the Pediatric Brain Electrophysiology Lab. She studies at the University of Pittsburgh where she is majoring in Neuroscience and Sociology. Brigit is interested in examining the clinical outcomes of pediatric epilepsy patients who have undergone surgical treatments and utilizing these findings to improve medical care. Brigit hopes to continue neuroscience research and has future plans to matriculate to medical school.
Brigit Joseph
Irina is a junior at Carnegie Mellon University where she is working towards a bachelor's of science in Neuroscience with a minor in Gender Studies. Through the CMU Summer Undergraduate Research Fellowship Program, Irina investigated seizure freedom outcomes using Vagus Nerve Stimulation in patients with medically intractable epilepsy. Irina hopes to pursue a medical degree after graduation.
Irina Kramkova