Get to know the Schmidt Lab!
Marc Schmidt
Raised in Belgium, Dr. Schmidt attended Swarthmore College where he majored in Biology and was a member of a national championship winning tennis team. Dr. Schmidt received his PhD in Colorado where he studied the developing nervous system and spinal cord regeneration. He then did his postdoctoral work at Caltech with Dr. Mazakazu Konishi studying the neural bases of vocal production and perception in songbirds. Dr. Schmidt is professor in the Biology department where he continues his studies on neural aspects of vocal production and learning with a special interest in how social context shapes brain circuitry. Dr. Schmidt has received several scientific awards including a Basil O’ Connor Award from the March of Dimes Foundation and an Alfred P. Sloan Fellowship award. In addition to teaching and research, Marc is also involved in raising awareness of Tourette Syndrome and serves on the national chapter’s scientific advisory board.
Natalia Aponte Borges
Nati is a 5th year PhD student in the lab. She is working on In-Situ hybridization.
Christina Bardjis
Christina is a PhD candidate in Biology. Prior to joining the bird world, she completed Masters research in the behavioral ecology and evolution of threespine stickleback fish. She then graduated to working as a research technician at the Harvard Medical School, where she contributed to parallel projects examining the behavioral and molecular function of neuronal activity-dependent and immediate-early genes (IEGs) in vivo, using mouse and primate models. Now at Penn with ongoing intrigue in understanding complex behavioral phenotypes, she aims to investigate the underlying neural mechanisms and context-dependent regulation of social behaviors in cowbirds.
Maya Langer
Maya is a research technician and manages the lab. She graduated from Haverford College with a B.S. in Biology, and plans to continue her studies in graduate school. Maya is interested in the proactive role of female songbirds in determining courtship outcomes, and the neural mechanisms that underlie female signals. She wants to illuminate the selectivity and mutability of female choice in a dynamic social context. She loves literature, Latin as well as English, and also enjoys hiking and skiing.
Caleb Scott-Joseph
Caleb is a PhD candidate in the Physics department. He first started doing research in astrophysics as an undergraduate at Swarthmore college. Then he worked with Vince Formica doing social network analysis in Forked Fungus Beetles at the Mountain Lake Biological Station. He graduated in May 2024 from Swarthmore College majoring in Biology and Physics. Now at Penn he works primarily on the aviary project hoping to use the smart aviary as a way to study social behavior.
Undergraduates
Srishti Bansal
Srishti is a junior from Long Island, New York pursuing a dual degree in Systems Engineering and Cognitive Science. In the lab, she has been working to analyze and track bird movement in three-dimensional space, as well as camera synchronization. She has also been updating the lab website. Outside of research she’s involved in a variety of organizations including The Daily Pennsylvanian and Unearthed Children’s Magazine, and loves to read, explore new places, and learn about anything and everything.
Beatrice Cai
Beatrice is a sophomore at Caltech majoring in Biology and Economics, interested in pursuing a career in medicine as a physician in the future. She is from Princeton, New Jersey and is also a college swimmer at Caltech. She is working in the Schmidt Lab over the summer, learning about the neuroanatomy and neural circuitry of cowbirds, and exploring RNA quantification methods of in-situ images from courtship wingspread behaviors. Outside of school and swim, Beatrice also enjoys hiking and reading!
Graci Davidson
Born and raised in North Carolina, Graci is a sophomore majoring in Biology, hoping to pursue a career in Neuroscience Research or Medicine. She finds joy in traveling, exploring Philadelphia (such as trying new food spots), and playing the piano. At the lab, she is interested in studying the neuroanatomy and behavior of cowbirds through understanding the neural mechanisms utilized during courtship displays. Fun fact, she is also fluent in Spanish!
Liam Dell
Venturing from the snowy tundra of Buffalo, New York, Liam is a senior studying Neuroscience and will be attending medical school next year. Ever since Dr. Schmidt guest lectured in his freshman year neuroethology class, Liam has been especially interested in the neuroanatomy of songbirds and how what we learn from them can be applied to the human brain. When not in-situ hybridizing, Liam is busy as the president of three different undergraduate organizations and meditating in Kaskey Park where he can pretend he is deep in the woods.
Arda Enfiyeci
Arda is a rising senior from Turkey, studying Networked and Social Systems Engineering with a minor in Cognitive Science. This summer, he explpored the connections between birdsong and wing movements. In the future, he aims to use network structures and game theory to analyze animal social behavior. Outside of research, Arda enjoys photography, watching movies, and playing soccer.
Eric Tao
Eric is a senior studying mathematics, cognitive science, and linguistics, with a particular interest in computational neuroscience. They find studying birdsong to be a perfect intersection of these disciplines, and their primary jobs in the lab are analyzing how male cowbirds vary their song in different social contexts and building programs for processing and analyzing aviary data. They plan on applying to PhD programs and are always happy to talk about science communication or pedagogy. Outside of research, they like playing piano and viola, reading and writing, and knitting and crocheting.
Doha Gassem
Doha Gassem is a high school senior in the Academy at Palumbo. She currently lives in Northeast Philadelphia and is hoping to major in Neuroscience and Linguistics to learn more about the connections between speech and the brain. Doha is also very interested in social behavior when it comes to interactions and hopes to further this exploration through the lab. Currently, she is working on analyzing and quantifying sound acoustic data on birdsongs using Spike2. Aside from the lab, she is an avid Wordle player (practically a routine) and enjoys long-distance running.
Read more about our wonderful lab alumni here!