team lead

Raghav K. Chhetri

Raghav K. Chhetri has a background in designing, building, and applying custom bioimaging technologies to diverse biological problems. He obtained his PhD in Physics (2013) from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and completed his postdoctoral training (2013-2016) in Philipp Keller’s lab at HHMI Janelia Research Campus, where he continued as a Research Scientist (2016-2021) and a Senior Scientist (2021-2022) prior to joining the Rockefeller University in 2022. In his current role as a Team Lead at the MBO, he leads the technical operation of the Brain Observatory by transitioning, refining, and extending cutting-edge neuroimaging technologies and overseeing associated data pipelines. He also advises and guides the Rockefeller scientists on custom/advanced optical system instrumentation, and oversees collaborative projects at the MBO.  

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Computational scientist

Flynn O’Connell

Flynn O’Connell has a background in neuroscience, software development and scientific computing. He completed his Bachelors in Neuroscience (2018) from the State University of New York at Binghamton and continued as a Research Scientist (2018-2022) in Patricia Di Lorenzo’s lab. Flynn went on to develop computational pipelines as a software engineer at Cornell University before joining the Rockefeller University in 2023 as a Computational Scientist at the MBO. In his present role, he manages the data processing workflow to efficiently process neuroimaging data, while also extending and streamlining existing pipelines to support various projects at the MBO. 

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DIRECTOR

Alipasha Vaziri

Alipasha Vaziri is the Head of the Laboratory of Neurotechnology and Biophysics at the Rockefeller University. As a founder of the MBO, he was instrumental in defining its vision and orchestrating support for its realization. Under his leadership, the MBO was founded through joint financial support of the Kavli Neural Systems Institute and the University in 2022. In the role of a Director at the MBO, he oversees the scientific direction of the Brain Observatory and works synergistically with the MBO team, Kavli Neural Systems Institute, and the University to fulfill the mission of the Observatory.