Neural Circuits of Decision-Making

We are recruiting talented and motivated PhD students to join an ARC-funded research program investigating how the brain transforms sensory information into decisions. Perceptual decision-making, the process by which noisy sensory input is integrated to guide behaviour, will be examined at the level of neural circuits to uncover how excitation-inhibition balance shapes the computations underlying evidence accumulation and decision making. The program is based at Monash University within the Turner Institute for Brain and Mental Health and the Monash Biomedicine Discovery Institute, led by Professor Mark Bellgrove and Dr Mehdi Adibi. It is conducted in close collaboration with Professor Redmond O’Connell at Trinity College Dublin and Dr Peter Murphy at Maynooth University. This PhD project focuses on the animal neuroscience component of the program. Students will investigate neural circuits underlying decision-making using rodent models, combining behaviour with large-scale neural recordings and causal manipulation of neural activity. The work involves training animals on decision tasks and applying advanced imaging, electrophysiology and optogenetics to link neural population dynamics to behaviour. Monash University is a top-50 institution globally, ranked 36th in the 2026 QS World University Rankings, with a strong international reputation in neuroscience and interdisciplinary research. It provides an excellent research environment with access to advanced facilities, a large neuroscience community, and strong integration between cognitive, systems, and computational neuroscience. The project benefits from close integration between physiology, cognitive and systems neuroscience, and computational modelling, and from an international collaboration that brings together complementary expertise across institutions. A range of scholarships is available through competitive schemes at Monash and nationally. Details can be found here: https://www.monash.edu/graduate-research/study/scholarships/fees-scholarships#ScholarshipsandgrantsforMonashAustralia and https://www.nhmrc.gov.au/funding/find-funding/postgraduate-scholarships A top-up scholarship of $5,000 per year is available for outstanding candidates. We are seeking candidates with strong motivation and interest in neural circuits and behaviour. Familiarity with Python or MATLAB is desirable, and experience or interest in animal experiments, particularly in rodents, will be an advantage.