Renate Rutiku
Renate Rutiku first stumbled upon the question of consciousness while studying psychology at the University of Potsdam in Germany. She was quickly captivated by the uniqueness of the problem and how it connects to many other brain functions such as perceptual processing and executive control. This fascination was deepened further at the Max Planck Institute for Brain Research where she conducted her Diploma thesis under the supervision of Prof. Lucia Melloni studying how prior knowledge influences conscious perception.
Renate carried out her doctoral studies at the University of Tartu (supervised by Professor Talis Bachmann). As part of our lab she studied the neural correlates of consciousness from a range of different angles, focusing mainly on improving the methodological aspects of consciousness research. After obtaining her doctoral degree in 2015 she joined the lab of Prof. Marcello Massimini in Milan for her first postdoctoral fellowship. There she studied auditory perception in patients suffering from disorders of consciousness and how brain-based measures can inform us about the level of an individual’s conscious state. During her stay in Milan she continued collaboration on the studies conducted in our lab.
In 2018 Renate rejoined us to continue work on the core topics of our lab. Currently, she is starting her second postdoc in Krakow at the lab of Prof. Michał Wierzchoń, but also staying in close contact with our team here in Estonia and supporting ongoing projects.
