LMG NeuroLearn Team

Mareike Grotheer received a Ph.D. in psychology from Friedrich Schiller University Jena and then completed 5 years of post-doctoral training in the Vision and Perception Neuroscience Lab at Stanford University. In 2021, she joined Marburg University as a Junior Group Leader and, in 2025, as a Professor. Since May 2026 she is the head of the Lise Meitner Research Group NeuroLearn at the Max Planck Institute for Human Development.

Simone Pezzatini received his M.Sc. in Cognitive Neuroscience with highest honors from Sapienza University of Rome. During his M.Sc. studies, he researched own-hand recognition and virtual reality at the Santa Lucia Foundation. In January 2026, he joined the Philipps University Marburg as a Ph.D. student in Psychology. Since May 2026, he is also a member of the Lise Meitner Research Group Neuroplasticity in Development and Learning at the Max Planck Institute for Human Development. His current research investigates experience-dependent myelination and motor skill learning using multimodal MRI.

Antonia Schulz earned her bachelor’s degree in Communication Science, Linguistics, and Book Studies at the Johannes Gutenberg-University of Mainz and her master’s degree in Cognitive and Integrative Systems Neuroscience at the Philipps-University of Marburg. As part of her master’s thesis under Mareike Grotheer’s supervision, she investigated the development of brain regions relevant to reading in children before they enter elementary school. In her doctoral research, she is now studying fetal brain development during pregnancy. For this work, she was awarded a scholarship by the Studienstiftung des deutschen Volkes.

Stephanie Zika has been pursuing her PhD under the supervision of Prof. Dr. Mareike Grotheer since November 2022. She earned her B.Sc. in Biology from Friedrich-Alexander University Erlangen-Nürnberg and her M.Sc. in Molecular and Cellular Neuroscience from Philipps University Marburg. Her research focuses on early brain development, particularly the maturation of white matter in newborns and young children.