UNIQUE-Mitacs Globalink Research Awards

UNIQUE- Mitacs Globalink Research Awards, 2020-2021

UNIQUE-Globalink Research Award covers a 3-6 months research internship at the intersection between neuroscience and artificial intelligence for incoming and outgoing undergraduate, graduate students and postdoctoral fellows. These awards are available through an agreement between UNIQUE and Mitacs.
[Closed competition]

  • Internship timeline: 3-6 months between April 1st 2020 and March 31st 2021

  • Total amount awarded: 6000$ CAD (independent of internship duration)

List of Eligible Countries: Argentina, Australia, Brazil, Chile, China, Colombia, all countries in the European Union, Hong Kong, India, Japan, Lebanon, Macao, Malaysia, Mexico, Morocco, New Zealand, Norway, Singapore, South Africa, South Korea, Switzerland, Tunisia, Ukraine, United Kingdom and United States.

Outbound mobility - UNIQUE students going abroad

List of awardees

Anthony Bilodeau

PhD student, Département de biochimie, de microbiologie et de bio-informatique, Université Laval

Project title: Machine learning for automated image analysis of the extracellular matrix

UNIQUE supervisors: Flavie Lavoie-Cardinal & Christian Gagné, Université Laval

Supervisor at host university: Silvio Rizzoli, University Medical Center Göttingen, Germany


Samuel Laferriere

PhD student, Computer Science, Universite de Montreal

Project title: Discovery of latent dynamics underlying learning in a Brain-Computer Interface task

UNIQUE supervisors: Guillaume Lajoie, Université de Montréal & Blake Richards, McGill University

Supervisor at host university: Amy Orsborn, University of Washington, USA

Victor Oswald

PhD student, Neuroscience, Faculté de Médecine, Université de Montréal

Project title: Brain - body interaction: using machine learning to predict interoceptive cognition altered by meditation

UNIQUE supervisor: Karim Jerbi, Université de Montréal

Supervisor at host university: Nazareth Castellanos, Universidad Complutense de Madrid (UCM), Spain

Anne-Lise Saive

Post-doctoral fellow, Département de Psychologie, Université de Montréal

Project title: Decoding the neural dynamics of emotion-related human memory optimization using AI-informed multivariate techniques

UNIQUE supervisor: Karim Jerbi, Université de Montréal

Supervisor at host university: Bryan Strange, Universidad Politécnica de Madrid, Spain

Thomas Thiery

PhD student, Psychologie, Université de Montréal

Project title: Decoding the neural correlates of dynamic decision-making in humans

UNIQUE supervisors: Karim Jerbi & Pierre Rainville, Université de Montréal

Supervisor at host university: Andrea Brovelli, Aix-Marseille University, France

Inbound mobility for foreign students

List of awardees


Xiaoyi Bao

Undergraduate student, Department of Computer Science and Engineering, Shanghai Jiao Tong University, China

Project title: Generalization of deep learning tasks for medical imaging applications

UNIQUE Supervisor: Julien Cohen-Adad, Polytechnique Montréal

Supervisor at home university: Hualin Fu, Shanghai Jiao Tong University

Colin Bredenberg

PhD student, Neural Science, New York University, USA

Project title: Analyzing noise compensation properties of trained recurrent neural networks

UNIQUE supervisor: Guillaume Lajoie, Université de Montréal

Supervisor Home University: Cristina Savin and Eero Simoncelli, New York University

Tal Dankovich

PhD student, Department of Neuro- and Sensory Physiology, University Medical Center Göttingen, Germany

Project title: An automatic analysis of protein topology in synapses

UNIQUE supervisors: Flavie Lavoie-Cardinal & Christian Gagné, Université Laval

Supervisor home University: Silvio Rizzoli, University Medical Center Göttingen

Thomas Dargent

Master's student, Master Science et Ingénierie des Données, Université de Rouen Normandie, France

Project title: Anatomically constrained domain adaptation for subcortical structure segmentation in MRI

UNIQUE supervisor: Ismail Ben Ayed, École de Technologie Superieure (ETS)

Supervisor home University: Caroline Petitjean, Université de Rouen Normandie

Soumya Suvra Ghosal

Undergraduate student, Electronics and Communication Engineering, National Institute of Technology Durgapur, India

Project title: Anatomically constrained domain adaptation for subcortical structure segmentation in MRI

UNIQUE Supervisor: Ismail Ben Ayed, École de Technologie Superieure (ETS)

Supervisor at home university: Durbadal Mandal


Lamyae IKAN

Master's student, Master Sciences du médicament et des produits de santé, Université Clermont Auvergne, France

Project title: Impact of Pulvinar on cortical visual processing

UNIQUE supervisor: Christian Casanova, Université de Montréal

Supervisor at home university: Pascal Coudert, Université Clermont Auvergne

Steven Jia

Master's student, Department of Engineering, École Centrale Lyon, France

Project title: Characterizing the link between cerebrovascular pathology and metabolism in Alzheimer’s disease using machine learning

UNIQUE Supervisors: Pierre Bellec & AmanPreet Badhwar, Université de Montréal

Supervisor at home university: Mohamed Ichchou, École Centrale Lyon, France


Daniel Lindh

PhD student, School of psychology, University of Birmingham, United Kingdom

Project title: Visual representations supporting category‐specific information about visual objects in the brain

UNIQUE supervisor: Frédéric Gosselin, Université de Montréal

Supervisor at home university: Ian Charest, University of Birmingham, United Kingdom


Yat Long Lo

Undergraduate student, Computer Science, University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong

Project title: Combining 3D game design and reinforcement learning to explore the neural mechanisms of embodied navigation

UNIQUE Supervisor: Paul Cisek, Université de Montréal

Supervisor at home university: Ka Wai Kwok, University of Hong Kong

Alexandre Pérez

Master's student, Applied mathematics and computer science, École Nationale des Ponts et Chaussées, France

Project title: Analysis of socio-demographics with missing values in the UK Biobank

UNIQUE supervisor: Jean-Baptiste Poline, McGill University

Supervisor at home university: Éric Duceau, École Nationale des Ponts et Chaussées

Constance Philippe

Master's student, Données, Analyse, Traitement et Applications en Signal et Image, Centrale Nantes, France

Project title: Generalization of deep learning tasks for medical imaging applications

UNIQUE supervisor: Julien Cohen-Addad, Polytechnique Montréal

Supervisor at home university: Diana Mateus, Centrale Nantes

Elias Ramzi

Master's student, Signal processing & Machine learning, CentraleSupélec, France

Project title: Image segmentation using deep learning

UNIQUE supervisor: Julien Cohen-Addad, Polytechnique Montréal

Supervisor at home university: Michel Barret, CentraleSupélec

Elisabetta Vallarino

PhD student, Department of mathematics, Università degli Studi di Genova, Italy

Project title: On the two-step approach for brain connectivity estimation from M/EEG data: the role of the spectral features

UNIQUE supervisor: Karim Jerbi, Université de Montréal

Supervisor at home university: Alberto Sorrentino, Università degli Studi di Genova

Leander Van Eekelen

Master's student, Biomedical Engineering, University of Technology Eindhoven, Netherlands

Project title: Improving the ability of deep neural networks to generalize on neuronal histology images

UNIQUE supervisor: Julien Cohen-Adad, Polytechnique Montréal

Supervisor at home university: Mitko Veta, University of Technology Eindhoven

Igor Leandro Vieira

Undergraduate student, LIRIS - Laboratoire d'Informatique en Image et Systèmes d'Information, École Centrale de Lyon, France

Project title: Characterizing the link between cerebrovascular pathology and metabolism in Alzheimer’s disease using machine learning

UNIQUE Supervisors: Pierre Bellec & AmanPreet Badhwar, Université de Montréal

Supervisor at home university: Emmanuel Dellandréa, École Centrale de Lyon

Ryan Vogt

PhD student, Applied Mathematics, University of Washington, USA

Project title: Understanding Dynamics of RNNs using Lyapunov Exponents

UNIQUE supervisor: Guillaume Lajoie, Université de Montréal

Supervisor at home university: Eli Shlizerman, University of Washington