Jianghao Liu
He/Him
I am gay and I am a cognitive neuroscientist.//
I am a cognitive neuroscientist studying how the brain creates imagination and consciousness. In particular, I research aphantasia, a condition affecting about 4% of people who do not experience mental images in their mind. By learning from their experiences, I hope to better understand how imagination works in all of us.
I completed my Ph.D. at the Paris Brain Institute (Sorbonne University) in 2023 and now work as a postdoctoral researcher in Paris. Before turning to neuroscience, I studied mechanical engineering at Arts et Métiers ParisTech — where we learn how to build cars and aircraft. Quite a change, right?
I was born and raised in a traditional family in China marked by fear, and from an early age I dreamed of escape through reading. Over time, that desire made me independent and brave enough to explore the unknown. My curiosity about my own inner world gradually became a scientific quest to understand how the brain shapes what we experience, imagine, and remember.