Biography

Dr. Leiker is a cognitive neuroscientist and postdoc in Psychiatry at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine, where she is training under Dr. Kym Young in multimodal neuroimaging and real-time neurofeedback to improve emotion cognition and memory function in depression. She earned her M.A. and Ph.D. in Cognitive Neuroscience at the University of Missouri Department of Psychological Sciences, after completing her undergraduate studies in Neuroscience and Psychology at Drake University. Her research combines brain and behavioral methods to understand how emotional memories are represented in the brain and unfold during recall, with a focus on therapeutic applications for mental health disorders. In addition to research, Dr. Leiker is an avid contributor to efforts promoting inclusion, retention, and advancement of women and other historically excluded groups in STEM.