Decoding Internal Speech with Neural Engineer Sarah Wandelt, PhD

NeuroCareers: Doing The Impossible!

What’s the most significant impact you can make with your career—medicine or engineering? For Sarah Kim Wandelt, PhD, this question has a personal twist! While Sarah originally set out to become a medical doctor, her career led her to the fascinating world of neuroengineering and neurotechnologies. Meanwhile, her twin sister, who had dreamed of being an engineer, is now a medical doctor. So, how did they end up switching roles, and what insights can Sarah share with aspiring professionals in neuroscience and neurotechnology?

In this episode of Neurocareers: Doing the Impossible!, your Podcast Host, Dr. Milena Korostenskaja from the Institute of Neuroapproaches, interviews Dr. Sarah Wandelt on her exciting journey, from her groundbreaking work on Speech Brain–Machine Interfaces (BMIs) to her cutting-edge research on decoding internal speech signals. As a Neural Engineer at the Feinstein Institutes and a former Postdoctoral Scholar at Caltech, Sarah has been at the forefront of developing technologies that translate brain signals into speech—offering life-changing solutions for people who have lost their ability to communicate.

Her publication, "Representation of internal speech by single neurons in the human supramarginal gyrus" in Nature Human Behaviour, showcases how decoding internal speech is not just a possibility but a reality. Sarah will share insights into how Brain–Machine Interfaces can decode internal speech and how her work is opening up new frontiers in neurotechnology.

Curious how a career in neuroengineering can impact lives? Or how decoding the brain’s inner voice is revolutionizing communication? Tune in to this episode as Sarah shares her journey, career advice, and her fascinating work in speech BMIs.

Get ready for an inspiring conversation about innovation, neurotechnology, and building a career that makes a difference!

About the Podcast Guest:

Dr. Sarah Wandelt is a researcher specializing in Neuroprosthetics, focusing on developing technologies to restore motor and sensory function for individuals with spinal cord injuries. Her academic path began at École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne, where she pursued a Master's degree in Bioengineering with a minor in Neuroprosthetics, gaining experience in non-invasive EEG and EMG devices. This foundation led to her PhD at the California Institute of Technology, where she explored the representation of grasp and speech signals in brain recordings of participants affected by spinal cord injury under the mentorship of Professor Richard Andersen. Her work involved decoding internal speech from multielectrode unit recordings from the posterior parietal cortex, earning her the Dr. Nagendranath Reddy Biological Sciences Thesis prize. Currently, as a Neural Engineer in Professor Chad Bouton's lab at the Feinstein Institutes for Medical Research, she aims to restore function and sensation in participants with spinal cord injury.

Get in touch with Sarah Wandelt, PhD:

Social Media: @sarah_wandelt on X

LinkedIn: Sarah Kim Wandelt https://www.linkedin.com/in/sarah-kim-wandelt-25a509b3/

Link to Representation of internal speech by single neurons in human supramarginal gyrus:

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41562-024-01867-y/metrics

Data and code availability: https://zenodo.org/records/10697024

Link to Decoding grasp and speech signals from the cortical grasp circuit in a tetraplegic human:

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0896627322002458

Code availability: https://zenodo.org/records/6330179

Data availability: https://zenodo.org/records/7618556