Fani Koukouli is a prestigious neuroscientist with a remarkable career path. 

She started her studies at the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki in Greece where she obtained a Doctorate in Pharmacy (DPharm) and a Master’s in Neuroscience. The choice of her degree was not random, as from the age of 14 she got fascinated by the psychiatric patients she met during a school visit at a clinic. This experience intrigued her curiosity about the brain function.

After her Master’s degree, she decided to continue her studies in the Paris-Pasteur University, where she worked towards her doctoral degree. Choosing this doctoral program was a very thorough decision. The candidate selection for this doctoral program was very competitive but despite that she was one of the few people being offered the opportunity to pursue her doctoral studies there. Her PhD was directed by Owe Maskos and the topic of her project was on Integrative Neurobiology of Cholinergic Systems Unit. In this project she compared brains from healthy and non-healthy individuals in order to elucidate the role of nicotinic receptors in spontaneous neuronal activity.

Fani continued her scientific career after her PhD as a postdoctoral researcher in the same laboratory. Her research findings indicate potential therapeutic candidates for schizophrenia! However, her work does not stop there. Currently she is trying to answer questions about the Alzheimer’s disease and possibly identify new therapeutic molecules for Alzheimer’s patients too.

Of course, the hard work pays of: Fani’s efforts and talent on brain research have led to many awards. In 2017, the French Ministry of Health awarded her the Unafam Biomedical Science Research Award. In the same year, she received the prestigious “Woment in Science” Fellowship from L’Oréal-UNESCO. Last, she was awarded the “Gandy de la Chancellerie des Universités de Paris” prize.