What is your project about and why did you choose SCAN-Unit for it?
Alexandra Heinz (AH): Being part of the Cluster of Excellence funded by the Austrian Science Fund (FWF), my research focuses on developing and optimizing behavioral and fMRI paradigms to investigate amygdala function, connectivity, and their relationship to GABAergic neurotransmission. I plan to develop a psychometric and behavioral test battery to reliably engage amygdala circuits and to link behavioral measures with functional connectivity and GABA spectroscopy data.
During the final year of my Psychology Master, I worked as a student assistant in the SCAN-Unit and experienced the lab as a very supportive and positive environment. It truly felt like the ideal place to grow and develop as a young researcher.
Sara Binder (SB): My project focuses on the neural bases of social perception in pet dogs. I chose the SCAN Unit because it is a diverse research environment with expertise in many different areas.
Tobias Reimann (TR): My project develops methods to study GABAergic neurotransmission in humans in the context of social and affective processes. The central goal is to establish robust, non-invasive in vivo measures of GABA in the amygdala and connected circuits using magnetic resonance spectroscopy (MRS), and then to relate these neurochemical markers to functional brain connectivity and behavior. Practically, this means optimizing acquisition protocols for a technically challenging ventral brain region, running pilot and validation work, and building reliable processing and quality-control workflows. In parallel, I implement functional connectivity approaches—especially emerging concepts such as connectivity fingerprints and gradients and plan to connect these to public gene-expression resources to add biological context.
I chose the SCAN-Unit and the Cluster of Excellence because I wanted to develop methods in a setting that is both technically rigorous and closely tied to meaningful neuroscience questions. The SCAN unit fosters a collaborative, supportive culture and strong mentorship, and the CoE allows me to conduct research in dynamic, international teams led by world-class scientists committed to open science and scientific impact.
What excites you the most about your PhD and what worries you a bit?
AH: I’m excited to deepen my knowledge, gain hands-on experience, and connect with new people in the field. At the same time, because I started my PhD right after completing my Master’s degree, I still often feel quite inexperienced, almost like starting from scratch again. But I see this as part of the process, and I’m looking forward to growing, learning, and developing my skills over the next four years.
SB: I am most excited about learning: new methods, new techniques, new information, etc. I am also thankful to be able to devote such a large portion of my time to researching a topic I am very passionate about. I think because I just started, the excitement outweighs the worries. But for example, I do worry about job opportunities in academia after finishing my PhD.
TR: What excites me most is the opportunity to expand what can be measured in humans and to make those measurements reliable enough that others can build on them. I enjoy the iterative process of improving acquisition, testing what actually improves data quality, and translating that into transparent, reproducible workflows. I also enjoy that my work is embedded in a larger interdisciplinary collaboration. Working with colleagues across the cluster of excellence brings complementary expertise, strengthens the project, and allows me to contribute to the effort to study fundamental brain functions in social cognitive neuroscience. What worries me a bit is the inherent uncertainty that comes with pushing measurement into difficult territory. With GABA MRS in the amygdala, small technical decisions can influence data quality, and validation takes time. There is also the challenge of balancing development with application: you want to be rigorous in establishing reliability while still progressing toward interpretable neurobiological questions. I try to manage that by using clear quality metrics, predefined analysis decisions where possible, and stepwise milestones that separate optimization, validation, and application.
If your research were a movie, a song or a dish, what would it be and why?
AH: One of my favorite and most haunting movies, Shutter Island, the main character constantly faces ambiguous, uncertain, and potentially threatening situations, exactly the kinds of contexts in which the amygdala would likely be most engaged in real life. The amygdala responds strongly not only to clear threats but also to uncertainty and ambiguity, helping to evaluate unclear emotional cues and prepare adaptive responses to potential danger.
SB: I don’t know… Maybe “Who let the dogs out?”?
TR: If my research were a movie, it would be a scientific detective film. Much of the work feels like careful forensic investigation: improving how the evidence is collected (acquisition and protocols), checking its quality with transparent QC, and testing whether the conclusions hold up through validation and reproducible analysis. The story only comes together when multiple clues point in the same direction—GABA MRS, functional connectivity patterns, behavioral readouts, and molecular context—so it is less about a single dramatic reveal and more about building a reliable chain of evidence that others can trust and build on.
We wish all three of them a fantastic start and all the very best!
