Welcome! We are a humble team of researchers passionate about vision science, the brain, and team barbeques in the park. Learn more below about who we are now and who we used to be.
Principal Investigator
Keisuke Fukuda
Kei’s research focuses on our ability to select goal-related information from a plethora of irrelevant information (selective attention), represent and manipulate the selected information (working memory), and store and retrieve the information later in time (long-term memory). He approaches his research questions utilizing electrophysiological recordings (e.g., scalp EEG, ERP, single-unit recordings, and local-field potentials) and an individual differences approach. He is also interested in assisting and improving human cognition by translating the findings and techniques in cognitive psychology and neuroscience.
UTM Faculty Page
PhD (Psychology) University of Oregon
MS (Psychology) University of Oregon
BSc (Psychology, minor in Mathematics) University of Oregon
Graduate Students & Postdocs
Greer Gillies
Greer is a PhD student co-supervised by Jonathan Cant from UTSC and is interested in perception and visual working memory. Her current projects involve ensemble coding and stimulus memorability. When not sobbing over an excel spreadsheet, Greer is either painting or asleep.
MA (Psychology) University of Toronto, 2021
BSc (Psychology) University of Guelph, 2018
Nursima Ünver
Nursima is a PhD student in the MPUTC Joint PhD program and is co-supervised by Rosanne Rademaker. She studies attention, long-term memory, and working memory, focusing on their interactions while guiding human behavior. Besides her enthusiasm for research, she is a foodie who loves to explore and cook different cuisines.
MSc (Psychology) Sabancı University, 2022
BSc (Psychology) Middle East Technical University, 2020
Olya Bulatova
Olya’s current research looks at the role of predictive coding in memory and perception. Her research interest lies in the interaction between unconsciousness and conscious awareness; specifically, what factors determine what we end up perceiving. Outside of the lab, she enjoys watching comedy TV shows, cooking, and (forcing herself) to read for leisure.
HBSc (Psychology Specialist) University of Toronto, 2023
Manda Fischer, Ph.D.
Manda is a postdoctoral researcher and cognitive neuroscientist in the Fukuda Lab, with a background in audiovisual perception and memory. Her research explores how prior knowledge interacts with incoming sensory information, focusing on how long-term memory and attention shape perception, especially in challenging conditions. I primarily use behavioural methods, EEG, and statistical modeling to understand how the brain combines these different sources of information to support perceptual inference.
Manda first “caught the research bug” during her bachelor’s thesis, exploring how low-level acoustic features, like timbre, and high-level factors, like experience, shape our perception of orchestral music. That curiosity has stayed with her ever since, weaving together both her work as a researcher and her life as a musician!
PhD (Psychology – Cognitive Neuroscience) University of Toronto
MA (Psychology – Cognitive Neuroscience) University of Toronto
HonBSc (Psychology) McGill University
Lab Manager
Saud Altayar
Saud’s current project examines the relationship between metacognitive accuracy for visual working memory and long-term memory. Broadly, his research interests lie in the factors that elicit memory distortions as well as potential interventions for mitigating them. Outside of the lab, he enjoys gaming, going to the gym, and attempting to increase his fluid intelligence with dual n-back training (just don’t tell him it doesn’t work).
HBSc(Psychology Specialist) University of Toronto, 2025
Undergraduate Researchers
Project Leaders
Project leaders are responsible for data collection, analyses, and the presentation of their current experiments in the lab (among other things!)
Mahveen Salman Mubarak
Mahveen is an undergraduate thesis student interested in how the brain’s predictions shape what we remember and misremember. Her work explores why false memories arise, how they persist, and whether cognitive strategies can help keep memories honest and accurate (at least a little). Outside the lab, she enjoys baking unhealthy amounts of food in a never-ending quest to perfect recipes, and rewatching The Office for what feels like the millionth time, still amazed by how much she loves it.
Pursuing: Neuroscience Specialist and Psychology Minor
Daniel Nikitin
Daniel Nikitin is an undergraduate thesis student with interests in decision-making, reward, and risk-taking behaviour. His work focuses on understanding how cognitive biases and prior information shape people’s decisions and choice behaviour, and whether these biases can systematically manipulate how individuals learn from and respond to rewards.
Pursuing: Neuroscience Specialist
Saba Halabisaz
Coming soon!
Pursuing: Coming soon!
Ria Sahota
Coming soon!
Pursuing: Coming soon!
Research Assistants
Below are Fukuda Lab Research Assistants (RAs) with the projects they are involved in. These projects are being run by the project leaders or graduate students in the lab.
- Maddy Bruzzesse: Visual Working Memory and Metacognitive Accuracy
- Joy Fadhi: Prediction-based false memory
- Caroline Yuan: Prediction-based false memory
Collaborators
Our lab works together with leading minds across the globe.
- Awh/Vogel lab @ University of Chicago
- Woodman lab @ Vanderbilt University
- Tsubomi lab @ Toyama University
- Luria lab @ Tel Aviv University
- Kang lab @ Sungkyunkwan University
- Gunseri lab @ Sabanci University
- Bae lab @ Arizona State University
- Adam lab @ Rice University
- Oberauer lab @ University of Zurich
- Rademaker lab @ Max Planck Institute
- Xiong-Bearfield lab @ Georgia Institute of Technology
- Yamaguchi lab @ University of Essex
- Liesefeld lab @ University of Bremen
- Schmitz lab @ University of Duisburg-Essen
- Ngiam lab @ Adeleide University
- Styrkowiec lab @ University of Wroclaw
Our lab also works together with leading minds across the GTA (Greater Toronto Area)!
- Ronfard lab @ University of Toronto Mississauga
- APPLY lab @ University of Toronto Mississauga
- Cant lab @ University of Toronto Scarborough
- Neimeier lab @ University of Toronto Scarborough
- Barense lab @ University of Toronto St. George
- Bernhardt-Walther lab @ University of Toronto St. George
- Duncan lab @ University of Toronto St. George
- Mack lab @ University of Toronto St. George
- Alain lab @ Rotman Research Institute
- Mostovitch lab @ Rotman Research Institute
Alumni
Graduating years of Fukuda Lab alumni and what they pursued next!
2025
Frida Printzlau, Ph.D. – Postdoc at U of T with Dr. Michael Mack
2024
Joseph Saito, Ph.D. – Postdoc, at UCSD with Dr. Timothy Brady
Caitlin Tozios, Ph.D. – Lecturer at UTM
Hana Yabuki – Ph.D. at CMU with Dr. Susanne Ferber
Shaumiga Ranjan – Master of Management of Innovation program at UTM
Riya Malik – Master of Spiritual Care and Psychotherapy at Wilfred Laurier University
Amanda Jani – Master of Science at U of T Institute of Medical Science
Andre Ardona – English Teacher for ECC, Japan
2023
Olga Kozlova – PhD (Psychology), Rice University
Isha Khalid – MI (Master of Information), University of Toronto
Dyllan Simpson – PhD (Psychology), University of California San Diego
Hoejae Kim – MD (Doctor of Medicine); pursuing
Meyha Chhatwal – Researcher, Language, Attention, Music, & Audition (LAMA) Lab; Lab Manager, Health, Emotions, & Altruism Lab (HEAL)
2022
Amit Dalaya – MMPA (Master of Management & Professional Accounting), University of Toronto; Co-op, Ernst & Young
Joie Kim – Forensics Identification, Humber College; Student Border Services Officer, Canada Border Services Agency; MA (Public Policy and Administration), Toronto Metropolitan University
Linh Pham – Mental Health Worker, Hong Fook Mental Health Association
2021
Ben Park – Software Engineer, AMD
Matthew Kolisnyk – MSc (Psychology), Western University
Sabah Rasheed – MSc (Management: Organizational Behaviour and Human Resource Management), Wilfrid Laurier University
Lisa Crocco – MSc (Psychology), Queens University
Jerrick Teoh – Wealth Planning Manager, DBS Bank Singapore
Zoryana Babiy – MSc (Neuroscience), McMaster University
Jaskiran Garcha – MSc (Biology), University of Toronto
2020
Amanda Leonetti – MSc (Biology), University of Toronto
2019
Rosa Torres – MA (Psychology), Brock University
Fatima Wasif – PhD (Clinical Psychology), University of Waterloo
April Pereira – MA (Cognitive Psychology), University of Waterloo
Sabina Iqbal – BSN (Nursing) University of New Brunswick
Shawall Pall – PhD (Clinical Psychology), Fairleigh Dickinson University
Asma Fadhl – BASc (Occupational Health & Safety), Ryerson University
Hirotaka Sone – MA (Psychology), Toyama University
2018
Erica Chen – MSc (Health: Science, Technology & Policy), Carleton University
Anjali Pandey – MSc (Experimental Psychology), Dalhousie University
Special Recognition
Thank you to the individuals who contributed to the advancement of memory and cognition research in the Fukuda Lab!
Jason Woo
Sophia Winter
THE FUKUDA LAB 