Benjamin Gaub is a doctoral candidate in the Department of Neuroscience at UC Berkeley. His thesis project aims at restoring vision in animal models of human blindness using optogenetics, with the aim of translation to human therapy, providing a strong scientific background. His contributions to the Sonic Eye project include building the team, introducing Jeff Hawkins and IDEO to the project and consulting with blind individuals directly as well as contacting institutions for the blind.
Dr. Jascha Sohl-Dickstein is currently a postdoc in applied physics at Stanford University, where he does research in both machine and human learning. He enjoys building robots, musical instruments, and human echolocation devices in his spare time.
Santani is a Ph.D. candidate in the Department of Psychology studying the mechanisms of human echolocation. He has published measures of echolocation performance in sighted volunteers and blind expert echolocators, and he brings theoretical knowledge of echolocation as well as practical experience with human testing to the Sonic Eye project.
Alex Maki-Jokela is an engineer at Enphase Energy working on applying machine learning techniques to solving problems in solar energy. He brings a breadth of engineering experience to the team and contributes to software development and fine-tuning the user experience on the Sonic Eye. In his free time he can be found climbing, powerlifting, and tinkering with human senses .
Nicol Harper is a postdoctoral neuroscientist researching hearing at the University of Oxford. He has a PhD in Auditory Neuroscience from University College London. Along with Jascha Sohl-Dickstein he concieved and made the first several prototypes of the device. He also supplied much of the initial funding for the device. He brings an in depth understanding of the neuroscience and psychology of hearing, essential developing a device for human echolocation.
