Jacob Zavatone-Veth

Jacob Zavatone-Veth is a Junior Fellow of the Harvard Society of Fellows. His research is broadly focused on the theory of neural computation, with particular emphasis on how representations and dynamics are learned. He was first introduced to neuroscience during his undergraduate work in physics at Yale, where he studied visual motion detection and locomotor coordination in fruit flies with Damon Clark. He then came to Harvard for his Ph.D.; his doctoral work with Cengiz Pehlevan applied tools from statistical physics to investigate the structure of learned representations in natural and artificial neural networks. He is a recipient of a 2024 NIH Director's Early Independence Award (DP5), and of the 2024 American Physical Society Dissertation Award in Statistical and Nonlinear Physics.