Linda Wilbrecht’s research is focused on how experience alters neural circuits that contribute to value based decision making. Recent projects in the lab are focused on food insecurity and autism. The lab also has a long history of studying adolescent brain development. Linda did her PhD research in the laboratory of Fernando Nottebohm at the Rockefeller University and postdoctoral training at Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory with Karel Svoboda and UCSF with Michael Merzenich. From 2008-2013, Dr. Wilbrecht was an Assistant Professor in the Department of Neurology at UCSF and an Investigator at the Ernest Gallo Clinic and Research Center. In 2013,  Wilbrecht moved her lab to the Psychology Department at the University of California, Berkeley and became a member of the Helen Wills Neuroscience Institute. She is also a recipient of the 2009 NIMH Biobehavioral Research Award for Innovative New Scientists (BRAINS award) and a 2010 Presidential Early Career Award for Science and Engineering (PECASE). She is an standing member of the Neurobiology of Motivated Behavior study section and a member of the National Scientific Council on Adolescence based at the The Center for the Developing Adolescent. Portrait by Peg Skorpinski for UC Berkeley VCR.