College of Arts and Sciences

Education:

• PhD, Institute of Medical Science & Collaborative Program in Neuroscience, University of Toronto, 2014
• BSc Hons, Biology, York University, 2009

Curriculum Vitae:

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Research Interests:

• Network neuroscience
• fMRI
• Intracranial EEG
• Spontaneous thought
• Attention
• Experience sampling
• Mental health

Bio:

Aaron Kucyi is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Psychological and Brain Sciences and is a Core Faculty Member within the Applied Cognitive and Brain Sciences Program. He completed a Ph.D at the University of Toronto followed by postdoctoral training at Massachusetts General Hospital/Harvard Medical School and Stanford University.

Kucyi directs the Dynamic Brain and Mind Lab, a cognitive and clinical neuroscience research group. The Lab has a focus on the on the neuroscience of spontaneous thought, a phenomenon that is intricately linked with the brain’s attention, memory, and cognitive control systems. Spontaneous thoughts, and related experiences such as mind-wandering and rumination, occupy up to half of a person’s typical waking life and are fundamental to everyday cognitive function and mental health. The Lab’s major goal is to improve theoretical understanding of how mental experiences arise from spontaneous brain activity. To this end, current projects focus on developing innovative neuroimaging and electrophysiology approaches (e.g. real-time fMRI) and personalized neuromodulation strategies (e.g. neurofeedback) for testing and discovering relationships between brain activity and ongoing cognition.

Kucyi’s research involves multiple techniques in human neuroscience such as fMRI, scalp EEG, intracranial EEG, pupillometry, and multimodal integration (simultaneous EEG-fMRI). Behavioral paradigms include experience sampling and various assessments of mental health, attention and memory functions. Computational approaches draw extensively from machine learning/predictive modeling, signal processing, network science, and advances in personalized neuroimaging.

Kucyi has authored over 60 journal articles and book chapters that have appeared in publications such as Nature Communications, Nature Mental Health, and PNAS, and Journal of Neuroscience. This research has been supported by funding from the National Institute of Mental Health (NIH-NIMH), the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR), the Brain and Behavior Research Foundation, and an Antelo Devereux Award for Junior Faculty from Drexel University.

Selected Publications:

• Kucyi, A., Anderson, N., Bounyarith, T., Braun, D., Shareef-Trudeau, L., Treves, I., Braga, R.M., Hsieh, P., Hung, S (2024). Individual variability in neural representations of mind-wandering. Network Neuroscience [in press].
  https://direct.mit.edu/netn/article/doi/10.1162/netn_a_00387/121182
• Kucyi, A., Kam, J.W.Y., Andrews-Hanna, J.R., Christoff, K., Whitfield-Gabrieli, S., 2023. Recent advances in the neuroscience of spontaneous and off-task thought: implications for mental health. Nature Mental Health 1:827-840.
  https://www.nature.com/articles/s44220-023-00133-w
• Kucyi, A., Esterman, M., Capella, J., Green, A., Uchida, M., Biederman, J., Gabrieli, J.D.E., Valera, E.M., Whitfield-Gabrieli, S., 2021. “Prediction of stimulus-independent and task-unrelated thought from functional brain networks.” Nature Communications 12(1):1-17. 
  https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-021-22027-0
• Kucyi, A., Parvizi, J., 2020. “Pupillary dynamics link spontaneous and task-evoked activations recorded directly from human insula.” Journal of Neuroscience 40(32):6207-6218. 
  https://www.jneurosci.org/content/40/32/6207.abstract
• Kucyi, A., Daitch, A., Raccah, O., Zhao, B., Zhang, C., Esterman, M., Zeineh, M., Halpern, C.H., Zhang, K., Zhang, J., Parvizi, J., 2020. “Electrophysiological dynamics of antagonistic brain networks reflect attentional fluctuations.” Nature Communications 11(1):325. 
  https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-019-14166-2
• Kucyi, A., Schrouff, J., Bickel, S., Foster, B.L., Shine, J.M., Parvizi, J., 2018. “Intracranial electrophysiology reveals reproducible intrinsic functional connectivity within human brain networks.” Journal of Neuroscience 38(17):4230-4242. 
  https://www.jneurosci.org/content/38/17/4230.abstract
• Kucyi, A., Tambini, A., Sadaghiani, S., Keilholz, S.D., Cohen, J.R., 2018. “Spontaneous cognitive processes and the behavioral validation of time-varying brain connectivity.” Network Neuroscience 2(4):397-417. 
  https://direct.mit.edu/netn/article/2/4/397/5423/Spontaneous-cognitive-processes-and-the-behavioral
• Kucyi, A., 2018. “Just a thought: How mind-wandering is represented in dynamic brain connectivity.” Neuroimage 180:505-514. 
  https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S1053811917305694
• Kucyi, A., Hove, M.J., Esterman, M., Hutchison, R.M., Valera, E.M., 2017. “Dynamic Brain Network Correlates of Spontaneous Fluctuations in Attention.” Cerebral Cortex 27(3):1831-1840. 
  https://academic.oup.com/cercor/article/27/3/1831/3056303
• Kucyi, A., Esterman, M., Riley, C.S., Valera, E.M., 2016. “Spontaneous default network activity reflects behavioral variability independent of mind-wandering.” Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 113(48):13899-13904. 
  https://www.pnas.org/doi/abs/10.1073/pnas.1611743113
• Kucyi, A., Davis, K.D., 2014. “Dynamic functional connectivity of the default mode network tracks daydreaming.” NeuroImage 100:471-80. 
  https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S1053811914005217
• Kucyi, A., Salomons, T.V., Davis, K.D, 2013. “Mind wandering away from pain dynamically engages antinociceptive and default mode brain networks.” Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 110(46):18692-7.
  https://www.pnas.org/doi/abs/10.1073/pnas.1312902110