Wiktoria Pawlak

ML/Bio Research Engineer @ UC Berkeley | Rafał Brzoska Foundation Scholar | Forbes list 26 for 2026

San Francisco, California, United States

About

Current research focus: Bioelectricity and bioelectrical patterns in cells, their role in encoding cellular goals, tissue regeneration (regenerative medicine), and memory storage. Working on Generative ML models for science discovery. Interests/experience: Bio-computing, Generative AI, ML for science and neuromorphic systems for brain implants.

Experience

  • Research Collaborator — ML for Electrotaxis & Cell Dynamic at University of California, Davis
    Feb 2026 - May 2026 · 4 mos

    • Built end-to-end electrotaxis pipeline: Cellpose segmentation → trackpy tracking → optical flow, extracting trajectory features (directedness, displacement, velocity) under electric-field stimulation • Developing ML models to predict cell migration dynamics from time-lapse microscopy data

  • ML/Bio Researcher – Regeneration of cardiac tissue using piezoelectric stimulation at University of California, Berkeley
    Sep 2025 - May 2026 · 9 mos

    • Contributed to an IP-sensitive bioengineering capstone focused on engineered experimental systems for functional cell studies • Co-developed custom experimental workflows spanning device prototyping, biological preparation, assay design, microscopy acquisition, and data analysis • Built multimodal microscopy analysis pipelines for segmentation, motion quantification, fluorescence signal extraction, and quality control across brightfield and fluorescence datasets

  • B.Sc. Thesis — Bioelectricity & Regeneration at Levin Lab, Allen Discovery Center at Tufts University
    Jan 2025 - Jun 2025 · 6 mos

    • Developed computational model of bioelectric state transitions (healthy glia → glioblastoma) using membrane voltage (Vmem), gap-junction coupling (Cx43), and metabolic parameters with Hodgkin Huxley dynamics • Developed evolutionary search framework (ASAL-inspired) to identify intervention regimes that restore bioelectric gradients and normalize spatial pattern formation

  • Neurocomputational Researcher - Brain Interfaces at ni2o
    Jun 2023 - Feb 2025 · 1 yr 9 mos

    • Developing software for detecting Alzheimer's and Parkinson's diseases using EEG brain datasets (data analytics, applying statistics and machine learning techniques Recurrent Neural Networks (RNN) and Convolutional Neural Networks (CNN)). • EEG signal processing, including artifact removal, to support software enhancement and development. Training Large Language Models (LLMs) for medical user interface applications. • Research on energy transfer methods for brain implants, focusing on charging techniques and optimizing implant longevity/battery performance. • Research on biocompatibility of brain implants, including the use of carbon nanotubes for biocompatibility and stability in neuromorphic computing systems in implants. • Research and development in electrical engineering and design for brain implants, with a focus on optimizing implant performance and integration with neuromorphic computing architectures. • In-depth research on neuromorphic algorithms (including FPGA, electronics), specifically in the context of brain implant chips and the Brain Code Unit (BCU).

  • Neuroscience Research Fellow at Friedrich Miescher Institute for Biomedical Research
    Jul 2024 - Sep 2024 · 3 mos

    • Built CV pipeline aligning electron microscopy, light microscopy, and calcium imaging data for zebrafish olfactory circuit reconstruction • Implemented FFN-like deep learning for automated axon/dendrite segmentation from volumetric imaging data