PhD Course (D.M.226/2021)
Cognitive and Brain Sciences
COURSE SUMMARY
The PhD programme offered by the Centre for Mind/Brain Sciences-CIMeC lasts four years and is taught in English. It requires active participation in an environment enriched by the presence of many post-doc researchers and a significant number of international faculty and research staff.
PhD students gain high-level expertise in basic and applied research in the field of mind and brain sciences. The programme's strong interdisciplinary approach fosters the development of innovative and cutting-edge pathways in cognitive neuroscience, integrating knowledge from diverse research areas that have a shared focus on studying the nervous system, mental processes, and behaviour.
The programme's laboratories provide access to state-of-the-art methods for studying the neural correlates of cognitive functions, measuring human and animal behaviour, molecular neurobiology and neuroanatomy, collecting neurophysiological data, and modelling brain function mechanisms.
The course in brief
OVERVIEW
- Animal cognition
- Computational neuroscience and cognition
- Conceptual representations
- Decision making and reasoning
- Development
- Human-centric machine intelligence
- Language
- Learning
- Memory
- Motivation
- Motor control and action planning
- Neurodevelopmental disorders
- Neuroimaging and brain connectivity
- Numerical cognition
- Perception and attention
- Systems and circuit neuroscience
- Vision
M-PSI/01 General psychology
M-PSI/02 Psychobiology and physiological psychology
BIO/05 Zoology
BIO/09 Physiology
ING-INF/05 Information processing systems
MED/26 Neurology
MED/27 Neurosurgery
FIS/07 Applied physics
L-LIN/01 Glottology and linguistics
INF/01 Informatics
To apply for the PhD programme, you must have one of the following qualifications:
- a specialist or master's degree or a degree issued under the previous regulations;
- a second-level diploma awarded by higher-education institutions for the fine arts, music and dance (AFAM, Alta Formazione Artistica e Musicale);
- an equivalent academic qualification obtained abroad (master's degree) that allows admission to the PhD program in the education system or in the country of issue and that is considered suitable by the selection committee for the sole purpose of accessing the course.
As for the 42th cycle, for this doctoral programme, the following are available:
- 4 positions covered by scholarships, funded by the University of Trento;
- 5 positions covered by topic-specific scholarships, funded by Fondazione Istituto Italiano di Tecnologia;
- 1 position covered by topic-specific scholarship, funded by Fondazione Bruno Kessler;
- 1 position covered by topic-specific scholarship, co-funded by Fondazione Museo Civico di Rovereto and by Centro Interdipartimentale Mente/Cervello (CIMeC);
- 1 position covered by topic-specific scholarship, funded by Centro Interdipartimentale Mente/Cervello (CIMeC) within the project “HIAP - Human-Inspired Artificial Perception, – Fondo Italiano della Ricerca (MUR_FIS_Fondo Italiano per la Scienza 2023) – CUP E53C25001830001;
- 1 position covered by topic-specific scholarship, funded by Centro Interdipartimentale Mente/Cervello (CIMeC) within the project “NATPRED - Naturalistic Predictions: How our brain anticipates the future in a dynamic world” – Fondo Italiano della Ricerca (MUR_FIS_Fondo Italiano per la Scienza 2025) – CUP E53C25002550001.
For information on topic-specific scholarships visit the dedicated page.
The admission call indicates:
- admission requirements;
- deadlines;
- admission procedure;
- details of the funded positions;
- availability of scholarships.
APPLY
The selection procedure is entirely online.
Consult the call to get all the information needed to register.
Complete the online application by 4:00pm (Italian time) on 7 May 2026.
