Hi, I am Dr. Laura Hansel!
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Focus

During my academic journey, I specialized in the following research areas.

Computer Science

I studied Computer Science, focusing on Markov Chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) methods and Conditional Random Fields (CRFs) in my theses while specializing in machine learning, data fusion, data mining, and parallel computing during my master's.

Machine Learning

Designed advanced ML projects, applying deep learning to model and analyze complex, noisy datasets. I implemented MLOps pipelines (using Python/PyTorch/Wandb) for data preparation, model training, and evaluation.

Neuroscience

I worked on the MICrONS project , analyzing large-scale 3D neuronal reconstructions to investigate the relationship between neural structure and function in the mouse visual cortex.

Research

During my PhD, I focused on representation learning, generative modeling and hierarchical clustering, developing methods to uncover meaningful structure in high-dimensional data.

Hierarchical clustering with maximum density paths and mixture models

arXiv, 2025

We developed a hierarchical clustering algorithm that automatically identifies structure at multiple scales without requiring the number of clusters to be specified in advance, and validated it on synthetic and transcriptomic datasets.

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An unsupervised map of excitatory neuron dendritic morphology in the mouse visual cortex

Nature Communications, 2025

We developed a graph-based machine learning method to derive low-dimensional morphological representations of over 30,000 excitatory neurons, enabling new insights into neuronal organization in the mouse visual cortex.

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MorphOcc, an implicit generative model of neuronal morphologies

openReview, 2024

We developed a generative model of 3D neuronal shapes to better understand the diversity of neuron morphology. The model learns meaningful representations, helps classify cells into cell types, and can generate new neuronal structures.

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Google Scholar

About

The timeline below summarizes the major milestones of my academic career.

  • 10/2013 – 09/2017

    B.Sc. Applied Computer Science

    Georg-August University | Göttingen, Germany

    Application-Oriented Systems Development

  • 10/2017 – 09/2020

    M.Sc. Applied Computer Science

    Georg-August University | Göttingen, Germany

    Application-Oriented Systems Development

  • 10/2020 – 11/2025

    PhD (Dr. rer. nat.) in Computer Science

    Georg-August University | Göttingen, Germany

    Machine Learning & Computational Neuroscience

  • 12/2025 - Today

    Post-Doctoral Researcher

    Georg-August University | Göttingen, Germany

    Machine Learning & Computational Neuroscience

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