Vall d'Hebron Talks by VHIR 'Brainwide circuits for adaptive decisions in response to threat'

Speaker: Dr. Sara Mederos, Hospital del Mar Research Institute.

Sara Mederos obtained her PhD at the Cajal Institute (CSIC, Madrid), where she pioneered new approaches to study astrocyte–neuron communication and demonstrated the role of astrocytes in goal-directed behavior. She was awarded the FENS Young Investigator Prize 2022 for this work. In 2020 she joined the Sainsbury Wellcome Centre at University College London as a postdoctoral researcher in Sonja Hofer’s lab, where she focused on the mechanisms underlying learned suppression of instinctive fear and then became a Wellcome Early Career Fellow, studying how cortical and subcortical circuits shape adaptive behavior. Since January 2026, she has established her independent lab at the Hospital del Mar Research Institute in Barcelona supported by La Caixa Junior Leader Fellowship.

Abstract:  To understand adaptive behavior, we must understand how decisions are computed and updated through experience. For example, when facing a potential threat, animals may initially rely on instinctive responses, such as escape, yet with experience they can suppress these reactions as the environment is reinterpreted. In this talk, I will show how these transformations arise from interactions between cortical and subcortical circuits that dynamically reshape decision variables in aversive contexts.

Host: Dr. Marta Vila-Pueyo. Miguel Servet Researcher. Headache and Neurological Pain Research Group. Vall Hebron Research Institute (VHIR)