PhD candidate in Neuroscience Harvard University

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I’m a neuroscience PhD candidate in Bernardo Sabatini’s Lab at the Harvard Medical School, where I work on understanding how neural circuits in both biological and artificial brains alter their connections to enable learning and flexible behavior.

My research utilizes cutting-edge system neuroscience techniques to uncover novel plasticity mechanisms during animal reinforcement learning, and turns resulting biological insights into better RL algorithms for AI agents. I also developing closed-loop systems to apply instantaneous control on the rodent brain.

I joined the Harvard PiN program in 2021 and worked on rotation projects with Chenghua Gu and Stephen Liberles, studying neuroimmune responses at the blood brain interface and vagal afferents. Prior to PhD, I obtained a Bachelor's degree in Neuroscience with minor in Computer Science and Psychology from Duke University in 2021. As an undergrad, I worked in Fan Wang’s lab, where I studied executions and coordinations of rhythmic orofacial movements from neuroscience and evolutionary perspectives.

Table of contents

My work at Harvard

Synaptic sign switching mediates online dopamine updates

biorxiv, 2025

Shun Li, Wengang Wang, Grace Knipe, Elliot Jerng, Paolo Capelli, Catherine Zhou, Eliana Bilsel, Bernardo Sabatini

• Discovered an unique form of synaptic plasticity in the brain, which allows synapses to switch between excitation and inhibition in an experience-dependent manner.
• We showed that such sign-switching plasticity mediates online update of dopamine and is crucial for reinforcement learning.
• This discovery challenges the long-held belief that synaptic plasticity between biological neurons are only changing the weights but not signs.
• My twitter thread explainer 🧵: click here
• Explainer in Deeper Learning Blog: click here

ATLAS: a rationally designed anterograde transsynaptic tracer

Nature Methods, 2025

Jacqueline F. Rivera, Haoyang Huang, Weiguang Weng, Heesung Sohn, Allison E. Girasole, Shun Li, Madeline A. Albanese, Melissa Qin, Can Tao, Molly E. Klug, Sadhna Rao, Ronald Paletzki, Bruce E. Herring, Scott E. Kanoski, Li I. Zhang, Charles R. Gerfen, Bernardo L. Sabatini & Don B. Arnold