Dominik Bach
Prof. Dr. Dr. Dominik Bach
TRA Steering Committee
Affiliations
  • Hertz Chair for Artificial Intelligence and Neuroscience
Research topics
  • cognitive-computational neuroscience
  • threat avoidance
  • human behaviour
Our goal is to understand the computing architecture of the human mind and brain. We bring the mind to its computational limits by putting it in its natural environment, where it needs to cope with survival threats. This requires rapid actions with utmost precision and continuous updating. To this end, our experimental platforms use serious games and virtual reality, as well as tightly controlled associative learning setups. Our theoretical models are informed by those used in artificial agents. Beyond understanding rational avoidance, we are also interested in psychiatric conditions that are characterised by avoidance actions in the absence of real threat, such as anxiety disorder or post-traumatic stress disorder. We seek to unpack the underlying mechanisms and develop novel treatments.
Selected publications

Korn CW & Bach DR (2018). Heuristic and optimal policy computations in the human brain during sequential decision-making. Nature Communications, 9: 325.


Castegnetti G, Tzovara A, Khemka S, Melinščak F, Barnes GR, Dolan RJ, Bach DR (2020). Representations of probabilistic outcomes during risky decision-making. Nature Communications, 11: 2419.


Bach DR, Melinščak F, Fleming SM, Voelkle M (2020). Calibrating the experimental measurement of psychological attributes. Nature Human Behaviour, 4: 1229-1235.


Ojala KE*, Staib M*, Gerster S, Ruff CC, Bach DR (2022). Inhibiting human aversive memory by transcranial theta-burst stimulation to primary sensory cortex. Biological Psychiatry, in press.

Dominik Bach
Prof. Dr. Dr. Dominik Bach
TRA Steering Committee

Am Propsthof 49

53121 Bonn

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