Katherine Bassil PhD
Guest Scientist
Katherine Bassil is an assistant professor at the Julius Center at the University Medical Center Utrecht (UMCU) in the Netherlands. Trained as a neuroscientist and neuroethicist, she conducts research at the intersection of neuroscience, neurotechnology, and neuroethics. Her current work focuses on emerging digital mental health tools, including conversational AI, and associated ethical considerations.
Katherine studied biology and psychology in Lebanon with a research elective at the Roslin Institute in Edinburgh, Scotland. She conducted her master’s thesis at the Salk Institute in La Jolla, California and completed her doctorate in 2023 at Maastricht University with a thesis on biological mechanisms involved in stress disorders and associated ethical considerations.
Katherine’s research interests include the emerging implications of neuroscientific models, invasive neurotechnologies, digital mental health technologies, public participation and involvement in research, science and ethics communication, and predictive biomarkers in psychiatry.
Katherine is actively involved in outreach and science policy within professional societies and international organizations. In particular, she is a member of the Outreach and Engagement Committee and Program Committee, and the co-lead of the public communication Affinity Group of the International Neuroethics Society (INS). She is an editorial assistant at Neuroethics Canada, the ethics lead of the Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers (IEEE) Neuroethics Framework Wellness Workgroup, and the lead of the Research Ethics track at the Atlas Bioethics Center. She is also a member of the International Brain Initiative (IBI) Cross-cultural Working Group.
Bassil has been granted the 2022-2023 Harvard Neuroethics Fellowship contributing to discussions on the ethics of predictive biomarkers for post-traumatic stress disorder, and more recently the prestigious Dutch Niels Stensen Fellowship, where she intends to investigate the ethics of AI chatbots for mental health support, at the Institute for History, Ethics of Medicine at the Technical University of Munich.
Katherine is also the founder of Neuroethics Today, an educative platform raising awareness on neuroethics worldwide and democratizing neuroethics literacy.
- Neuroethics
- Implantable neurotechnology
- AI chatbots
- Research ethics
- Empirical bioethics