Dinesh Natesan, Ph.D.

about me

I am an engineer-turned-neuroscientist (much like many others out there). I finished my undergraduate degree from the Birla Institute of Technology, Pilani with a rather fun 5-year dual degree in Electronics (bachelor’s) and Biology (master’s). After a brief internship in the industry (Texas Instruments, Bangalore), I decided I should first experiment with scientific research before settling into an industry position. One thing led to another, and I enrolled for a Ph.D. through the Erasmus Mundus-backed EuroSPIN graduate program.

My program was a joint Ph.D. in Life Sciences and Computer Science, co-advised by Prof. Sanjay P. Sane, NCBS, Bangalore, and Prof. Örjan Ekeberg, KTH, Stockholm. I investigated the control architecture of antennal positioning in insects using behavior and electrophysiology experiments alongside control theory and neural circuit models (more on it here). In the process, I sharpened many skills—like building custom experimental setups, patiently performing experiments, developing software pipelines, and building complex computational models. Importantly, I honed my curiosity, scientific mindset, and drive to keep learning 🤓

In the end stages of my Ph.D., I took my experimentation even further and tried out entrepreneurship. From 2019 to mid-2020, taking advantage of the lag phase between submitting a journal article and getting it accepted, I co-founded LightSpeedAI Labs, an optical computing hardware startup. This arose from an interest in machine learning, which began as coursework and then flourished into running journal clubs and workshops. In time, I realized that my passion lay at the intersection of several disciplines and I returned to give academia and neuroscience another chance.

I am now a postdoc at Sung Soo Kim’s lab at the University of California, Santa Barbara, where I study how, like us, fruitflies detect and use visual features to navigate the world.

currently…

🧠 Learning:

• Bayesian statistics
• AI alignment through the GAIA journal club

📖 Reading:

• Bayesian Rethinking by Richard McElreath
• Immune: A Journey into the Mysterious System That Keeps You Alive by Philip Dettmer

🔬 Working on:

• Building a novel two-photon microscope
• Recording activity of neurons in the central complex

You can find my notes on my learnings, readings, technical notes and thoughts on my umwelt / digital garden.