People

Yoeri van de Burgt

Yoeri van de Burgt obtained his PhD degree at Eindhoven University of Technology in 2014. He then briefly worked at a high-tech startup in Switzerland, after which he obtained a Postdoctoral Fellowship at the department of Materials Science and Engineering at Stanford University (USA) with prof. Alberto Salleo. 

Since November 2016 he has returned to Eindhoven University of Technology where he is leading the Neuromorphic Engineering group within the Mechanical Engineering department, and as part of the Institute for Complex Molecular Systems (ICMS) and the newly established Eindhoven A.I. Systems Institute (EAISI). He obtained his tenure in 2019 and was promoted to associate professor in 2021. Yoeri has been a visiting professor at the University of Cambridge (U.K.) in 2017 and Georgia Tech (U.S.) in 2022.

Yoeri was a member of the Eindhoven Young Academy since 2019 and was the chair between 2021 and 2022. In 2019 he was selected as MIT innovator under 35 Europe. He is a member of the Scientific Advisory Board of the Groningen Cognitive Systems and Materials Center at the University of Groningen. Yoeri serves on the Editorial Board of IOP Neuromorphic Computing and Engineering and is an associate editor for Materials Science and Engineering R and Frontiers in Neuroscience: Neuromorphic Engineering.

More information: personal page at TU/e website.

Pei Zhang

Pei Zhang received her Master degree in Polymer Chemistry and Physics from South China Normal University, China, in 2019. Following this, she embarked on a new chapter at Eindhoven University of Technology (TU/e) to pursue her PhD in the Chemical Engineering and Chemistry Department. Under the guidance of Prof. Albert Schenning, she has developed structurally colored liquid crystal polymer materials, which found applications in optical sensors, temperature-responsive reflective coatings, and color-tunable soft actuators. She successfully defended her PhD thesis, titled “Structurally Colored Liquid Crystal Elastomer Actuators”, in August 2023. Subsequently, she joined the Neuromorphic Engineering Group at TU/e. During this exciting journey, she seeks to expand her expertise by integrating “memory” and “learning” capabilities into the responsive polymer materials she has explored, harnessing the potential of organic neuromorphic systems.

Charles-Théophile Coen obtained his master degree at Swiss Institute of Technology in Lausanne (EPFL) in microsystem with a specialization in micro- and nanosystem. His interest in neural implants and neuroengineering started early on during his Erasmus exchange at the Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm (KTH) and grew during his master degree where he mainly worked on flexible electronics for neural interface. For his master’s thesis at Stanford University, he worked on stretchable and photopatternable conducting polymer for high density electrophysiology and took charge of the design and fabrication of a device capable of recording surface EMG.
After his master degree, he worked at the Swiss Center for Electronics and Microtechnology (CSEM) in the Life microtechnologies department and focused on the automation of skin graft production.
In May 2021, Charles-Théophile joined the Neuromorphic Engineering group at Eindhoven University of Technology (TU/e). His main goal is to create artifical synapses that can detect neurotransmitters released by neurons and modulate their conductance accordingly.

Charles Coen

Benn Proper

Benn Proper obtained his Masters degree in mechanical engineering at the Eindhoven University of Technology with a specialization in dynamics and control. In collaboration with the Technical University of Munich (TUM), his master thesis focused on the development of a classification method for classifying the expectancy of measured simultaneous impact behavior using a computationally feasible prediction. Afterwards, he spent his internship abroad at TUM to validate the findings presented in his master thesis on an experimental setup. In May 2022, Benn started his PhD on a joint project between the Dynamics and Control soft robotics and Neuromorphic Engineering group. This project concerns the development of a hand-gripper system that can be locally optimized to form an optimized closed-loop connection between biological signals and artificial actuation using haptic feedback and neuromorphic control.

After getting inspired by his bachelor end project in the Neuromorphic Engineering group, where he designed a local feedback system for a hardware-based supervised neural network, Bob Huisman continued his master in Mechanical Engineering with a specialization in Microsystems at the Eindhoven University of Technology. For his internship he went to Linköping University to improve his feedback system and to try to locally train a physical weight array. For his graduation project he followed his interest in soft actuators and designed a light-actuated microvalve that could be used to actively control glaucoma drainage. In May 2023, he joined the Neuromorphic Engineering group. In collaboration with AMOLF, his aim is to develop smart and autonomous soft robotic systems with the help of organic neuromorphic devices that can improve their performance and are able to adapt to a changing environment.

Bob Huisman

Niels Burghoorn

Niels Burghoorn did a bachelor in Nanobiology and afterwards graduated in Biomedical Engineering at the Delft University of Technology (TUD), Netherlands, in 2022. During his studies he has always been interested in combining biology and engineering. Therefore, during his master degree he found a way to unite these multidisciplinary interests in the Bioelectronics group. Here he did his master thesis investigating the fundamental mechanisms of ultrasound neuromodulation by fabricating a high-bandwidth biosensing platform. In 2024, he joined the Neuromorphic Engineering Group at Eindhoven University of Technology (TU/e). Here his focus is on the interface between neurology and organic neuromorphics. He will be working on the creation of biohybrid interfaces, paving the way towards neuroprosthetics.

In 2022, Anthony graduated as an engineering scientist from the Catholic University of Leuven (KU Leuven), specializing in bio-nanotechnology. He wants to pursue a career in high-tech industry, with deep interests in brain computer interfaces (BCI), neuroprosthetics and biocybernetics. To do this, Anthony tries to develop himself as a multidisciplinary engineering scientist, which led him to pursue a self-proposed master thesis topic, where he used cell biology, chemistry and quantum physics to create nano-sized multimodal quantum sensors in cellular systems.
During his studies, he participated in the International Genetically Engineered Machine (iGEM) competition as co-team leader, founded the student organization NeuroTech Leuven and with this organization, competed in the international NeuroTechX competition. After his studies, he worked at a high-tech start-up to work on the creation of vocal prosthetics using BCI’s.
Anthony joined the Neuromorphic Engineering group at Eindhoven University of Technology (TU/e) in September 2024 as a part of the ERC-funded NeuroLabs project. He will work on the development and integration of biohybrid interfaces in control systems.

Anthony Vorias