Michael Yartsev, professor of neuroscience and bioengineering, has been named a 2026 Guggenheim Fellow by the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation. This prestigious fellowship is awarded to distinguished individuals from disciplines ranging from science to the arts, based on both prior career achievement and exceptional promise. Winners receive a stipend to pursue independent work under “the freest possible conditions.”
Yartsev’s lab has created new technologies to record brain activity in freely flying bats, giving them unprecedented insight into the neural mechanisms behind natural behaviors like socializing and communication. The fellowship will support Yartsev’s continued work to uncover the fundamental principles of how the brain generates adaptive behavior in realistic settings.
Read about the four UC Berkeley 2026 Guggenheim Fellows from UC Berkeley News.