Pembe Gizem Özdil
Ph.D. Student | Google Ph.D. Fellow
Neuroengineering & Biorobotics Laboratories
École polytechnique fédérale de Lausanne
(EPFL)
AI 1125 & MED1 1215
CH-1015 Lausanne
Switzerland
pembe.ozdil@epfl.ch

about me
I am a fourth-year Ph.D. student in Robotics at EPFL,
Switzerland, advised by Pavan Ramdya
and Auke Ijspeert.
My research lies at the interface of systems neuroscience and artificial intelligence. I primarily focus on
understanding the underlying mechanisms of motor coordination in Drosophila using behavior, physics-based
simulations and neural networks.
My long-term goal is to leverage biological insights from animals to develop better artificial
systems.
My early Ph.D. was in part supported by a Swiss Government Excellence Ph.D. Fellowship, and it is now funded by a Google Ph.D.
Fellowship.
Previously, I received my B.S. in Electrical & Electronics Engineering with a double major in Mathematics from
Boğaziçi University, Turkey where I worked on robot
localization at Işıl Bozma's Intelligent Systems
Laboratory.
news
Our paper Centralized brain networks underlie body part coordination during grooming is available on BioRXiv!
Our paper NeuroMechFly v2: simulating embodied sensorimotor control in adult Drosophila was published at Nature Methods!
I am visiting the Flatiron Institute in New York as a summer research intern!
I was awarded a Google Ph.D. Fellowship! See my interview with EPFL Research Office here.
I presented at Beyond the Connectome and Simulated Bodies in September at Janelia Research Campus, the USA.
I presented a poster at the 67th Benzon Symposium in September in Copenhagen, Denmark.
I presented a poster at Neuroscience 2022 in San Diego, the USA.
Our paper NeuroMechFly, a neuromechanical model of adult Drosophila melanogaster was published at Nature Methods!
I virtually presented at the symposium on Adaptive Motion of Animals and Machines and received an Honorable Mention!
I was awarded a Swiss Government Excellence Ph.D. Fellowship!
I started my Ph.D. at Neuroengineering and Biorobotics Laboratories at EPFL.
selected publications
For a full list of my publications, please visit my Google Scholar profile.


NeuroMechFly, a neuromechanical model of adult Drosophila melanogaster
Nature Methods, May 2022.