I am Thomas Andrillon, a post-doctoral fellow at Monash University in Melbourne and the University of New South Wales in Sydney (Australia).
I did my PhD at the Ecole Normale Supérieure in Paris (France) on brain's ability to process sensory information during sleep. I examined in particular how local modulations of brain activity such as sleep intrusions during wakefulness and wake intrusions during sleep impact the functioning of the brain.
I showed that, when we get tired, we may become slow at responding to images which is paralleled by neurons getting sluggish themselves. Conversely, when we are asleep, our brain does not completely shut from our environment and we can process auditory information complexly. My work suggests that we can even learn while sleeping!
I have now relocated in Australia in the laboratories of Prof. Nao Tsuchiya and Prof. Joel Pearson, where I will explore the neural mechanisms underlying dreams and whether day-dreaming and mind-dreaming rely on similar brain mechanisms.
Experience
2017–present
Postdoctoral research associate, UNSW
2012–2016
PhD Candidate, Ecole Normale Supérieure de Paris
Education
2017
Sorbonne University, Chancellery PhD Award
Publications
2017
Selective neuronal lapses precede human cognitive lapses following sleep deprivation, Nature Medicine
2017
Formation and suppression of acoustic memories during human sleep, Nature Communications
2016
Napping: A public health issue. From epidemiological to laboratory studies, Sleep Medicine Reviews
2016
Implicit memory for words heard during sleep, Neuroscience of Consciousness
2016
Neural markers of responsiveness to the environment in human sleep, The Journal of Neuroscience
2015
Perceptual learning of acoustic noise generates memory-evoked potentials, Current Biology
2015
Single-neuron activity and eye movements during human REM sleep and awake vision, Nature Communications
2014
Inducing task-relevant responses to speech in the sleeping brain, Current Biology
2011
Regional slow waves and spindles in human sleep, Neuron
2011
Sleep spindles in humans: insights from intracranial EEG and unit recordings, The Journal of Neuroscience