Cognitive Neuroscience Research Group
The Brainlab, led by Carles Escera, belongs to the Institute of Neurosciences of the University of Barcelona and the Institut de Recerca Sant Joan de Déu. We are located at the Faculty of Psychology, Department of Clinical Psychology and Psychobiology.
We are a small, multinational, interdisciplinary group, including psychologists, biologists, engineers, and physicists. We seek to unravel the brain mechanisms of cognitive functions, including attention, auditory and speech perception, motor-sensory interactions, and executive control. Also, we are interested in emotional and musical processing, and in cognitive dysfunction in a broad spectrum of neurological, neurodevelopment and mental disorders.
To achieve our goals, we combine the recording of the human electroencephalogram (EEG) to analyze evoked and event-related brain potentials (such as the Frequency-Following Response – FFR, the Middle Latency Response –MLR, or the Mismatch Negativity –MMN) and oscillatory brain activity, with magnetoencephalography (MEG), functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) and neurogenetic analysis. Part of our research is conducted in collaboration with labs located worldwide, such as the University of Helsinki and University of Jyväskylä (Finland), the Fukushima Medical University (Japan), the University of Leipzig (Germany) and the University of Salamanca (Spain). We are committed to higher-education training, at Master (Neuroscience and Research in and Behavior and Cognition programs) and PhD (Biomedicine/Neurosciences) levels.
Research lines
Cognitive auditory neuroscience
Carles EsceraPredictive processes in motor-sensory interactions
Iria SanMiguelNeural dynamics of affective processing
Judith Domínguez-BorràsCoherent oscillations at pitch rates in sensorimotor integration and voice production
Jordi Costa FaidellaCognitive neurogenetics
Marc ViaNumerical cognition and math anxiety
Maria Isabel Nuñez-Peña
News
The Juan de la Cierva 2025 Postdoctoral Fellowship Programme has officially opened, and Brainlab – University of Barcelona invites motivated researchers to express their interest in joining our group in cognitive neuroscience. About the Juan de la Cierva 2025 Programme The Juan de la Cierva call aims to promote the incorporation of young PhD researchers into Spanish R&D institutions to […]
02/12/2025
A new study authored by Laura Jacxsens, Natàlia Gorina-Careta, Alejandro Mondéjar-Segovia, and colleagues from the University of Antwerp and led by Carles Escera at the Brainlab (University of Barcelona) has just been published in Ear & Hearing. The authors tested four simple speech sounds to answer the key question: which stimulus best captures how the brain encodes speech? Their results […]
25/11/2025
PhD Opportunities at BrainLab fully funded through the “la Caixa” Doctoral INPhINIT Fellowships 2026
The BrainLab – Cognitive Neuroscience Research Group at the University of Barcelona invites talented and motivated young researchers to join our team through the prestigious “la Caixa” Foundation Doctoral INPhINIT Fellowship Programme. The “la Caixa” Doctoral INPhINIT Fellowships support outstanding early-stage researchers of any nationality who wish to pursue a PhD in Spain or Portugal. The programme offers: A competitive […]
11/11/2025
