Zachariah Reagh
Principal Investigator
BS & BA: University of Alabama at Birmingham (2012)
PhD: University of California, Irvine (2017)
Postdoc: University of California, Davis (2017-2020)
Zach received his BS in Psychology and BA in Philosophy from the University of Alabama at Birmingham. He earned his PhD in Neurobiology and Behavior from the University of California, Irvine, where he trained with Mike Yassa. His dissertation work focused on the functional organization of the hippocampus and medial temporal lobe cortex as individuals discriminate between interfering memories about objects and spatial organization, and how these brain regions were impacted by aging. He then completed his postdoctoral training at the University of California, Davis, working with Charan Ranganath. His postdoctoral work focused on how memory representations in cortico-hippocampal networks are extracted from naturalistic stimuli (e.g., movies), and how aging affects neural responses at the boundaries separating events. Zach’s current interests include the way structured knowledge is built from dynamic experiences, and how different aspects of event representations may be uniquely vulnerable in the aging brain.
When he isn’t doing research or teaching, Zach can be found attempting to juggle too many hobbies ranging from cycling to cooking to guitar to occasionally hurting himself on a skateboard. He has two dachshunds, which can sometimes be spotted around the lab.
Adi Upadhyayula
Postdoctoral Scholar
BE, MS: BITS Pilani, India (2013)
MS: North Carolina State University (2016)
MA: Johns Hopkins University (2018)
PhD: Johns Hopkins University (2021)
Postdoc: University of California, Davis (2021-2023)M
shanmukha@wustl.edu
Personal website
Bio coming soon.
Savannah Born
Graduate Student
BS: Johns Hopkins University (2020)
Savannah Born received her BS in Neuroscience from Johns Hopkins University. During her undergraduate career she worked in Dr. Janice Chen’s lab, studying human memory using narratives and naturalistic stimuli. After graduating, she worked as the lab manager for the labs of Dr. Janice Chen and Dr. Chris Honey for three years. Her current research interests involve incorporating personality and social psychology to investigate individual differences in interpretation/memory of complex stimuli. Outside of the lab, Savannah can be found trying to learn cool gymnastics tricks, deeply immersed in a fantasy video game or book series, or walking her cat Milo on a leash.
Angelique Delarazan
Graduate Student
BA: University of California, Davis (2018)
Angelique Delarazan received her BA at the University of California, Davis, where she majored in Psychology and minored in Human Development. During her undergraduate career, she worked in Dr. Alison Ledgerwood’s Attitudes, Groups, and Identities Lab, studying framing effects on decision making. Angelique also worked in Dr. Charan Ranganath’s Dynamic Memory Lab, utilizing naturalistic paradigms to investigate the processes that support human memory. After graduating, she worked as a Junior Research Specialist in the Dynamic Memory Lab for two years. She is currently interested in the mechanisms underlying forgetting and its role in memory encoding and retrieval. She is also interested in understanding how temporal structure influences the construction of mental representation for events. Outside of the lab, Angelique enjoys spending time with family and friends, editing videos, and exercising.
Ata Karagoz
Graduate Student
BS: University of Texas at Austin
Personal websitea.b.karagoz@wustl.edu
Ata Karagoz received his BS in Neuroscience from the University of Texas. During his undergraduate career he worked under Drs. Kate Sherrill and Hannah Roome in Dr. Alison Preston’s Lab, studying spatial memory in virtual navigation tasks. After graduating he worked as the lab manager for the Preston Lab for two years. His current work deals with the formation and manipulation of knowledge structures in narrative tasks. He is also interested in how reward can modulate memory processes such as pattern separation. Ata reads a lot of science fiction and is currently trying to pick up bass guitar.
Rayna Tang
Graduate Student
BS: University of Toronto
rayna@wustl.eduRayna Tang received her Honours BS from the University of Toronto in Canada, where she specialized in Psychology and majored in Cognitive Science. During her undergraduate career, she worked in Dr. Michael Mack’s lab, studying the relationship between scene categorization and visual search. She also worked in Dr. Morgan Barense’s Memory and Perception Lab, understanding the memory formation of patients with amnesia. She did her undergraduate thesis in Dr. Asaf Gilboa’s lab, investigating the relationship between the ocular movement, imagination, and hippocampus activity in people with PTSD. Her current interests lie on the deconstruction of elements underlying episodic memory and their related brain mechanisms. Outside of the lab, Rayna spends her time on ballet, film photography, and trying cool stuff.
Sarah Morse
Lab Manager
BS: University of Alabama at Birmingham (2011)
MS: University of Alabama at Birmingham (2012)
morse@wustl.eduSarah received her BS in Molecular Biology and MS in Biology from the University of Alabama at Birmingham. At UAB, she studied the molecular mechanisms of memory decline during aging with a particular focus on the role of epigenetics in the hippocampus. Prior to joining the Complex Memory Lab, Sarah managed several research labs studying topics ranging from cancer biology to neurogenomics. When not in the lab, she can be found baking, cycling, hiking, catering to the whims of her two dogs, or trying her best not to kill her plants.
Undergraduate Research Assistants
Evie Chen
Evie is an undergraduate majoring in Cognitive Neuroscience in the class of 2024. She joined the lab because of her interest in computational modeling of behavioral and neural data of memory research. She also wants to learn more about how different networks of brain regions represent different components of an event and how the functional organization of the brain plays a role in memory. Outside of the lab, one of her favorite pastimes is learning to do various kinds of handicrafts.
Ron Fishman
Ron is an undergraduate at the College of Arts & Sciences in the class of 2024. He is pursuing a major in Biology on the Neuroscience track with a minor in Medical Humanities on the pre-medical track. Ron’s interests are in the ties between neuroscientific processes and the subjective psychological experiences they help explain, particularly related to personal differences when reflecting on similar memories. In his free time, Ron loves exploring music, trying out new restaurants, playing tennis, travel, and spending time with friends.
Lizbeth Guijarro-Magana
Bio coming soon.
Ajay Guduputi
Bio coming soon.
Veronica Lee
Veronica is an undergraduate at WashU majoring in Cognitive Neuroscience and minoring in Educational Studies on the pre-medical track and is anticipated to graduate in 2024 with a BA from the College of Arts and Sciences. She is interested in the intersection of neuroscience and education, as well as in the physiological effects of childhood multilingualism and its practical effects on learning and executive function. Stemming from her aspirations in the medical field, she is also interested in neuroimaging and neuropathology, especially regarding memory and sensory disruptions. Her interest in the neuroscientific implications of early multilingualism originate from her own experience speaking three languages her entire life and picking up a fourth while living in Singapore for five years before university.
Sofia Angulo-Lopera
Sofia is a sophomore majoring in Comparative Literature and Cognitive Neuroscience. Broadly, her research interests include language, memory decline, and development. When she’s not in the lab, she enjoys cycling, dancing salsa, and writing.
Jahnavi Nair
Bio coming soon.
Julia Strauss
Julia is an undergraduate student in the College of Arts and Sciences class of 2024 double majoring in Biology on the Neuroscience Track and Spanish. Her main research interests include the neurological pathways involved with memory and the relationship between memory and perception of time. In her free time she enjoys hanging out with friends, playing the guitar, working at a cat cafe, and exploring the neighborhoods around WashU.
Alumni
Undergraduate Research Assistants
Elena Bosak
Holly Graziano
Maya Greene
Jacob Tartakovsky
Tiana Mao
