Headshot of Jakob Voigts.

Jakob Voigts

Group leader
Howard Hughes Medical Institute

Jakob Voigts is a group leader in the Mechanistic Cognitive Neuroscience research area at the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Janelia Research Campus. His lab studies how the brain rapidly builds models of the world and updates hypotheses during naturalistic behavior. He is also co-founder of Open Ephys, an open-source initiative aimed at improving neuroscience research tools.

Voigts studied mathematics at the University of Heidelberg, where he began neuroscience research on naturalistic tactile behavior in Bert Sakmann’s lab with Tansu Celikel. He earned his Ph.D. at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, studying cortical computations with Christopher Moore and Emery Brown, and completed postdoctoral work with Mark Harnett at MIT before joining Janelia.

Explore more from The Transmitter

Research image of locus coeruleus

Brain’s blue spot possesses unexpected structure-function ties

The spatial arrangement of neurons in the locus coeruleus of mice corresponds with the cells’ targets across the brain, according to a new study.

By Holly Barker
25 May 2026 | 4 min read
Howard Fields.

In memoriam: Howard Fields, pain research pioneer

Over six decades, Fields mapped out the circuits of both pain and addiction.

By Natalia Mesa
22 May 2026 | 7 min read
Hand points to letters on a board.

Still no proof for facilitated spelling methods

A systematic review into whether the “rapid prompting method” or “spelling to communicate” can help autistic people express themselves comes up empty yet again.

By Brendan Borrell
21 May 2026 | 6 min read