Meet our neuroscience consultants
Alex Kaula, PhD
Senior R&D Scientist
Alex joined Francesca Cormack and Nick Taptiklis in his role as R&D Scientist in September 2020, and is helping them to develop new tasks and analysis methods, particularly on the NeuroVocalix platform.
His PhD was completed at the MRC Cognition and Brain Sciences Unit, University of Cambridge, where his work focused on brain mechanisms of memory and attention. He used neuroimaging and cognitive experiments to address how systems in the brain manage competing demands, and modelled the impact on memory formation of managing multiple concurrent tasks.
Barbara Sahakian, FMEDSci FBPsS,
Senior Consultant and Co-inventor of CANTAB®
Prof. Sahakian is the co-inventor of the CANTAB® and Professor of Clinical Neuropsychology at the University of Cambridge. Her research is aimed at understanding the neural basis of cognitive, emotional and behavioural dysfunction in order to develop more effective pharmacological and psychological treatments. The focus of her research is in early detection, differential diagnosis and proof of concept studies using cognitive enhancing drugs. She has published over 300 papers in the area of Alzheimer’s disease, ADHD, Depression, obsessive-compulsive disorder, substance abuse and Schizophrenia.
Elizabeth Wragg, PhD,
Director of Statistical Science
As Director of Statistical Science, Elizabeth works with pharmaceutical, biotechnology and academic clients to develop statistical analysis protocols for the analysis of cognitive endpoints in clinical trials and observational research studies. Since joining Cambridge Cognition in 2017, Elizabeth has supported the development of clinical trial enrichment tools, implemented Bayesian methodologies and conducted statistical analysis across a range of clinical trial designs and CNS disorders.
Elizabeth has a keen interest in the application of longitudinal analysis techniques and machine learning to clinical cohorts and is a fellow of the Royal Statistical Society. Elizabeth received her PhD in Biostatistics and Health Informatics from King’s College London.
Emily Thorp
Operational Science Manager
Emily joined Cambridge Cognition in 2017 after completing a BSc in Psychology from Loughborough University. She initially supported the use of CANTAB within academic research and has used this understanding to support the delivery and execution of CANTAB within clinical trials when she joined the pharmaceutical team as an Operational Scientist in 2019. Since then she has progressed to Operational Science Manager and now leads the Operational Science team in providing scientific and statistical consultancy to our pharmaceutical, biotechnology and academic clients.
Francesca Cormack, PhD,
Chief Scientist
Francesca is Chief Scientist at Cambridge Cognition. She has extensive experience of statistics, cognitive neuroscience and cognitive test development in a range of clinical populations. Since joining Cambridge Cognition in 2014, Francesca has worked to develop novel cognitive testing methodology to support high-frequency, near patient testing using digital technology, providing researchers and healthcare providers with unique insights into cognitive health.
Francesca obtained a PhD in Dementia with Lewy Bodies at Newcastle University, followed by post-doctoral and academic positions at University College London and at the Medical Research Council in Cambridge. She maintains academic collaborations focused on neurological disorders, ageing and dementia.
Kenton Zavitz, PhD,
Director of Clinical Affairs
Kenton has over 25 years of biotechnology and pharmaceutical experience with involvement in all aspects of the industry from drug discovery and clinical development through to pre-commercialization. Prior to joining Cambridge Cognition, Kenton served as Chief Scientific Officer for New Mexico-based biotech Zocere Inc. where he worked on developing a neuroprotectant drug designed to combat brain injury resulting from stroke. He currently serves on the Scientific Advisory Board for Exonate Limited, a start-up founded in 2013 at the University of Nottingham.
From 1998 to 2012, Kenton worked at Myriad Pharmaceuticals, Inc. in Salt Lake City and served in a variety of roles including Senior Director of Clinical Affairs, Chief Scientist of the tarenflurbil clinical development program (an investigational drug for the treatment of Alzheimer’s disease, developed through Phase 3), Director of Neurodegeneration Therapeutics Discovery and Director of Strategic In-licensing and Scientific Evaluation.
Kenton received his PhD in Biochemistry and Molecular Biology from The Sloan-Kettering Division of the Weill Cornell Graduate School of Medical Sciences in New York City. He was a Postdoctoral Fellow at the UCLA School of Medicine and was awarded fellowships from the Leukemia Society of America and the Jane Coffin Childs Memorial Fund for Medical Research.
Martina De Lillo, PhD,
Clinical Scientist
Martina joined Cambridge Cognition as clinical scientist after collaborating as a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Birmingham on a project focused on the effects of anxiety and sleep deprivation on cognitive and social abilities. Her PhD in Cognitive Psychology was completed at the University of Kent, where she investigated social cognitive abilities and their relationship with executive functions by using a variety of techniques such as eye-tracking and EEG.
She has also developed a cognitive training protocol aimed to train executive functions across the lifespan. Martina brings her expertise in cognitive abilities and a broad background and interest in cognition in health and disease, with interest and experience in mental health and various CNS disorders.
Nick Taptiklis,
Head of R&D Technology
As Head of R&D Technology, Nick develops innovative technological solutions to scientific and health challenges; exploring new methods for measuring cognition at scale by leveraging consumer hardware, crowd-sourcing, cloud infrastructure and analytics.
Since joining Cambridge Cognition in 2010, Nick has brought experience in translating scientific research into innovative mobile products and solutions.
He is interested in helping realise the potential for mobile and wearable technology to transform the treatment of mental health disorders. He has pioneered new methods of cognitive testing outside of the laboratory using off-the-shelf consumer devices and has developed integrated cloud-based analytic solutions combining physiological and cognitive data.
Nick’s past experience includes machine-vision, 3D database visualisation, voice recognition, security, Bluetooth content distribution, and many consumer-focused mobile apps.
Trevor Robbins, PhD CBE FRS FMedSci FBPsS,
Senior Consultant and Co-inventor of CANTAB®
Prof. Robbins is the co-inventor of the CANTAB. He is Professor of Cognitive Neuroscience and Head of the Department of Experimental Psychology at the University of Cambridge. He is also Director of the Cambridge University MRC-Wellcome Trust funded Behavioural and Clinical Neuroscience Institute (BCNI), the main objective of which is to inter-relate basic and clinical research in psychiatry and neurology.
Professor Robbins is a Fellow of the British Psychological Society, the Academy of Medical Sciences, and the Royal Society. He has published over 600 peer-reviewed papers and 70 chapters in scientific journals and has co-edited 6 books.
