BEN BECKER

Prof. Dr. rer. nat. Benjamin Becker, PhD

Director, Becker Lab

Email: ben_becker (@) gmx.de

Benjamin (Ben) Becker is currently a Full Professor at The University of Hong Kong and an Adjunct Professor at the University of Electronic Science and Technology of China. He received his degrees from the Universities of Trier and Duesseldorf and completed further training at the University of Bonn in Germany. Over the past ten years, he has established and led internationally successful research teams in Germany, Mainland China, and Hong Kong.

His research explores how the human brain regulates emotional and motivational experiences, how these processes become dysfunctional in mental disorders, and how they can be modulated by molecular targets (such as oxytocin and angiotensin II) and novel technologies (including neurotechnology and AI). To this end, his team employs a comprehensive range of approaches, including advanced MRI neuroimaging, computational/AI-based neural decoding, neuropsychopharmacology, and closed-loop modulation in both healthy individuals and clinical populations.

He has published more than 300 research and conceptual articles in leading journals, including Nature, Neuron, Nature Human Behaviour, Nature Communications, Nature Reviews Psychology, Advanced Science, Trends in Cognitive Sciences, PNAS, Molecular Psychiatry, American Journal of Psychiatry, and Biological Psychiatry. His findings have also been featured in numerous keynote talks and in international media reports such as The New York Times, Forbes, and Xinhua. His research has been supported by numerous competitive and talent-based projects, including funding from the German Research Foundation, the Ministry of Science and Technology, and the National Science Foundation. He currently serves as Principal Editor of Psychopharmacology, Executive Board Member of Advanced Science, Editor of Psychotherapy and Psychosomatics, and Co-Director of the CIBD Task Force of the Global Brain Consortium (GBC). He also coordinates the Cognitive Science Programme at HKU.