Francesco Battaglia, Professor of Theoretical and Systems Neuroscience at Radboud University, has been selected as Distinguished NIAS-Lorentz Fellow for the academic year 2025-2026.
Battaglia’s research focuses on understanding the role of the brain as an organ within the body, with an emphasis on how cognition is shaped by brain-body interactions. His project, Towards an embodied theory of brain function, challenges the traditional view of the brain as a mere computational device and proposes instead that cognition emerges from brain-body dynamics.
The Distinguished NIAS-Lorentz Fellowship, a prestigious interdisciplinary award, will allow Battaglia to collaborate with a range of scientists to develop a holistic theory of brain function. This approach challenges the currently dominant neuroscientific paradigm that the brain processes external information like a computer, and instead emphasises how the brain’s interactions with the body and environment are fundamental to all cognitive activity.
Research
Battaglia’s work will explore how patterns of brain-body interactions – from emotion to cognition – are repurposed by the brain to shape its activity. By integrating experimental neuroscience, theoretical models and neurotechnology, he aims to contribute to a more comprehensive theory of brain function that includes bodily feedback loops and interactions with the external world.
“This fellowship provides a unique opportunity to begin expand my research in an interdisciplinary way that could reshape our understanding of cognition,” said Battaglia. With this award, Battaglia joins a distinguished group of scientists whose work transcends traditional academic boundaries and offers the potential for new insights into human cognition.
On the Fellowship
The Distinguished NIAS-Lorentz Fellowship (DNLF) is awarded annually to a leading researcher to work at the interface between the humanities and social sciences on the one hand and the natural, life and technological sciences on the other.. Pivotal to the NIAS-Lorentz program is the understanding that important and exciting advances are to be expected in this kind of interdisciplinary research.
Wijnand IJsselsteijn is current Distinguished NIAS-Lorentz Fellow
The current Distinguished NIAS-Lorentz Fellow is Neuropsychologist and AI expert Wijnand IJsselsteijn. He is based at Eindhoven University of Technology. At NIAS he is working on his research: Psychology and Ethics Of Progressively Lifelike Embodiments in the Metaverse (PEOPLE in the Metaverse). The next call for DNLF nominations will be in January 2025 for the academic year of 2026 – 2027.