Education and key qualifications

• 06/07/2017       PhD cum laude: ‘Action planning in music production: evidence from fMRI and EEG studies

                        Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences, Leipzig, Germany

                        PhD Supervisors: D. Sammler, A. Villringer

• 2011                Master cum laude in Neurobiology

                        Università degli Studi di Pavia, Italy

• 2011                BA in Music (Flute, 9/10)

                        Istituto Superiore di Studi Musicali F. Vittadini, Pavia, Italy

Current position

• 2025                 Associate professor, Department of Translational Research and New Technologies in Medicine                       and Surgery, University of Pisa, Italy

Previous position(s)

• 2023 – 2025     Marie Skłodowska-Curie fellow

                     Italian Institute of Technology, Neuroscience of Perception and Action Lab, Rome, Italy

• 2022 – 2023     Postdoctoral researcher on ERC starting grant

                        Italian Institute of Technology, Neuroscience of Perception and Action Lab, Rome, Italy

• 2017 – 2021     Postdoctoral researcher on BBSRC and Alzheimer’s Research UK grants

                        UCL Ear Institute, University College London, London, United Kingdom

• 2017                Visiting doctoral fellow on Erasmus Mundus Exchange Network grant

                        Concordia University, Montreal, Canada

• 2013 – 2016     PhD student Neuroscience of Communication (IMPRS NeuroCom) Ph.D. program

                        Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences, Leipzig, Germany

​

Funding

2022                Marie Skłodowska-Curie Individual Fellowship (PI, € 188000)

2021                Alzheimer’s Research UK, ECR Bridging Grant (PI, £ 5000)

2020                Travel award, NeuromusicVII (Aarhus, Denmark), funded by UCL Ear Institute

2018                 Award for Invited Young Lecturers (IYL) at the Universal Acoustical Communication Month 2018, Sendai, Japan, funded by Tohoku University (£ 2000)

2017                 Outstanding Poster Award, Neuromusic VI, Music, Sound and Health, Boston, USA

2017                Travel award, Neuromusic VI (Boston, USA), funded by Concordia University

2016                Research visiting fellowship, Erasmus Mundus Exchange Network in Auditory Cognitive Neuroscience (PI, € 17.750)

2015                 Travel award, OHBM 2015 (Honolulu, Hawaii), funded by Research Academy Leipzig

10/2012            4-year PhD studentship within the IMPRS Neuroscience of Communication PhD program at the Max Planck Institute CBS, Leipzig (DE)

​

DISSEMINATION

Invited Scientific Conference Talks

2025                Symposium: ‘Looking for the building blocks of human musicality across species’, The 18th International Conference on Music Perception and Cognition (ICMPC), 2025, São Paolo, Brazil

2024                Symposium: ‘Processing of predictable and non-predictable melodic and rhythmic sequences’, The 10th World Mismatch Negativity Conference, Salamanca, SP.

2024                Symposium: ‘New Approaches and Technologies in Auditory Neuroscience’, Association for Research in Otolaryngology (ARO), Anaheim, USA.

2023                Symposium: ‘Online Experimentation in Audition: Recent Advances and Future Directions’, Association for Research in Otolaryngology (ARO), Orlando, USA.

2023                Symposium: ‘Auditory Expectations, Learning and Plasticity’, Association for Research in Otolaryngology (ARO), Orlando, USA.

2022                Symposium: ‘Music learning and memory: from sensorimotor activations to social interaction’, Italian Association of Psychology (AIP), 30’ conference, University of Padova, IT.

2018                 Invited speaker: ‘How acoustic regularities inform action planning: neural and behavioral evidence from piano performance’. Tohoku Universal Acoustical Communication Month (UACM) 2018, Sendai, JP.

 

Selected Scientific Conference Talks

2023                The 17th International Conference on Music Perception and Cognition (ICMPC), 2023, Tokyo, JP.

2023                Rhythm Perception and Production Workshop (RPPW), 2023, Nottingham, UK.

2021                Advances and Perspectives in Auditory Neuroscience (APAN), 2021, online

2021                UCL Neuroscience Symposium, 2021, London, UK.

2019                Advances and Perspectives in Auditory Neuroscience (APAN), 2019, Chicago, USA.

               Interdisciplinary Advances in Statistical Learning (IASL), 2019, San Sebastian, ES.

2018                Basic Auditory Science (BAS) 2018, Newcastle, UK.

Music & Eye-Tracking Conference, Max Planck Institute EA, Frankfurt/M., DE

The Neurosciences and Music – VI, Music, Sound and Health, Boston, USA

KogWis2014: How Language and Behaviour Constitute Cognition. Tübingen, DE

 

Invited to Scientific presentations at Seminars, Colloquia, or Lectures

2024                NeMO-CAMP 2024 workshop on Neuroscience and Music Ontology, the Institut de Neurosciences des Systèmes and the Institut de l'Audition, Marseille, FR

2024                GPIP – starting a grant proposal, Bicocca University, Milan, IT

2024                  Funding your research and beyond, Italian Institute of Technology, Milan, IT

2023                CogCom/BeCogBio Seminar WS 2023/2024, Vienna, AT

2023                GPIP – starting a grant proposal, Bicocca University, Milan, IT

2023                IMPRS Summer School, Max Planck Institute CBS Leipzig, DE

2023                International School for Advanced Studies (SISSA), Trieste, IT

2023                Trinity College, Institute of Neuroscience, The University of Dublin, Dublin, IR

2022                Cambridge Music and Science seminar series, University of Cambridge, UK.

2022                CLaME Lecture series, New York University (NYU), New York, USA.

2021                International Laboratory for Brain, Music, and Sound Research (BRAMS), Montreal, CA

2021                Cognitive Psychology Institute Colloquium, Vrije Universiteit, Amsterdam, NL

2020                 MMB/PANC Lecture Series, Goldsmiths 2019-2020, London, UK

Charing Cross Hospital Lectures, Imperial College London, London, UK

Instituto D'Or Pesquisa e Ensino, Rio de Janeiro, Brasil

 

Outreach activities for the public

My research was featured on/I was interviewed for:

daily press (The Economist, Die Welt, El Pais, ScienceDaily, La Repubblica, Corrriere della Sera, Il Foglio, Ecodiario, India Today, The Science Times South-Korea, Gigazine Japan, SciamBrasil, Correio Braziliense),

magazine (Nature Italy, Labour journal),

radio (FranceInter, Kulturradio, MDR, BR-Klassik, Deutschlandfunk)

TV (CBSNewyork US).

 

A list of outreach contributions is listed below (or here https://robsbianco.wixsite.com/website):

2024                Dancing to someone else’s beat, The multisensory challenges of group dancing– Festival della Scienza, Genova, IT

2024                Music, memory, and evolution – Scaldasole Bookshop, Milan, IT

2023                Music, Sounds, Images, Movements – European Researchers Night (MSCA), Rome, IT

2023                What is creativity? A dialogue between art and neuroscience – Daphne Roma, IT

2022                The Power of Music – 2nd edition, Teatro Kursaal Santalucia, Bari, IT

2017-2018        World Hearing Day’, London, UK

2016                The brain of classical and jazz pianists. Max Planck Institute, CBS, Leipzig, DE

​

EDITORIAL ROLES

 

Reviewer for the following:

Funding agencies:

European Research Council (ERC),

Royal National Institute for Deaf People (RNID).

 

Scientific Journals:

Nature Communications,

Journal of Neuroscience,

Neuroimage,

PLoS Computational Biology,

eNeuro,

Hearing Research,

Frontiers in Auditory Cognitive Neuroscience,

Frontiers in Neuroscience,

Neurobiology of Ageing,

Journal of Eye Movement Research,

Psychological Science,

Journal of Experimental Psychology: General,

PloS one,

Cortex,

Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience,

Cognition, Psychological Research,

Neuropsychologia,

Music Perception,

Music Scientiae,

Cognitive processing

 

Conferences:

International Conference on Music Perception and Cognition,

Music & Eye-Tracking Conference,

UCL Neuroscience Symposium,

Associazione Italiana di Psicologia (AIP).

​

​