Date: 8 June 2026 (Monday)
Time: 4:00 pm – 5:00 pm
Venue: Mrs Chen Yang Foo Oi Telemedicine Centre, 2/F, William M.W. Mong Block, 21 Sassoon Road
Host: Professor Michael Hӓusser

Chenchen is a principal investigator at Nanyang Technological University (NTU) Singapore. She received her PhD from Imperial College UK where she trained with Professor Thomas Knöpfel on the development and application of optical voltage imaging. She then joined NTU’s School of Medicine to set up her independent laboratory as a Lee Kuan Yew Fellow. Her team is currently committed to understanding how brain functions are shaped by development, uncovering novel therapies to adjust neurodevelopmental alterations, and advancing the application of optical neurotechnologies to this end. Her team's research activities are supported by the Lee Kuan Yew Fellowship programme, Singapore's Ministry of Health (National Medical Research Council) and LKCMedicine Dean's Fellowship.

Neurodevelopmental risk factors shape the brain’s developmental trajectory, thereby lastingly alter behaviour, reduce cognitive potential and lead to mental health issues. Using a mouse model of the neurodevelopmental disorder autism as a model of altered brain state, we observed that a single dose of the serotonergic psychedelic psilocybin could durably promote social behaviour in the autism model mice, while no increase in sociability was observed in isogenic control mice. We also observed that an awake psychedelic experience was not needed for this therapeutic effect, providing experimental evidence for a longstanding ongoing debate in the psychedelic field over whether a subjective experience is necessary for psychedelic’s therapeutic actions. Further, our recent work showed that psilocybin’s sustained therapeutic effect likely was mediated via epigenetic changes in the frontal cortex. These observations collectively led to our ongoing research programme, using awake behaving mice to examine whether and how shortfalls in frontal cortex-dependent executive functions may be ameliorated.

All are welcome.