Juan Gallego.

Juan Gallego

Principal investigator
Champalimaud Centre for the Unknown

Juan Gallego is principal investigator of the NeoCybernetics Lab at the Champalimaud Centre for the Unknown. His lab is affiliated with the Neuroscience of Disease and Neuroscience programs and the Center for Restorative Neurotechnology. It was previously part of Imperial College London’s Department of Bioengineering, where Gallego remains affiliated as honorary associate professor.

Gallego primarily focuses on understanding how the brain and spinal cord acquire, control and adapt motor skills. He is also interested in applying their findings to novel neurotechnologies to restore movement to people with neurological disorders. The lab pursues these goals based on a combination of behavioral experiments, multi-region neural recordings, data analysis techniques and computational models in mice and humans.

Gallego earned his M.Sc. in robotics and automation and his Ph.D. in electrical and electronics engineering at Universidad Carlos III de Madrid.

Explore more from The Transmitter

Illustrated collage of a monkey profile, a gloved hand holding a vaccine syringe touching an outline of the United States with two primates sitting near it, a strand of DNA, and flags of the United States and China in the background.

U.S. national primate research centers face an uncertain future

The facilities were meant to last 100 years. Four decades shy of that mark, amid flatlined funds and mounting political pressure, their directors are trying to find a path forward.

By Calli McMurray
9 October 2026 | 12 min read
Reflections of primates in lab equipment (bottom left: Rhesus macaque, top left: Pig-tailed macaque, bottom right: Crab-eating macaque. top right: Marmoset

What if nonhuman primate research goes away?

As the U.S. government takes steps to stop using nonhuman primates in research, The Transmitter investigates what that shift could mean for neuroscience.

By The Transmitter
9 October 2026 | 2 min read
Illustration of primate hands interacting with objects of cognitive tests.

The neuroscience questions that need nonhuman primates

The Transmitter asked 17 neuroscientists what questions might remain unanswered if support for nonhuman primate research continues to decline.

By Alissa de Chassey
9 October 2026 | 10 min read