Marlene Bartos is Professor at the Faculty of Medicine and Director of the Institute of Physiology I at the University of Freiburg, Germany. Her research focuses on the role of GABAergic inhibitory interneurons in neuronal circuit function, learning, and memory.
Her laboratory investigates how inhibitory interneurons regulate information processing in hippocampal networks, particularly in the dentate gyrus. Combining electrophysiology, in vivo imaging, optogenetics, and computational approaches, her work has revealed how inhibitory circuits contribute to the formation, stabilization, and retrieval of memory representations. Recent studies have highlighted the dynamic organization and plasticity of inhibitory networks during learning.
Her work has appeared in leading journals, including Nature, Nature Neuroscience, and Neuron. Professor Bartos coordinates the Collaborative Research Centre IN-CODE, is a member of the German National Academy of Sciences Leopoldina, and has received two ERC Advanced Grants.