Research

I study how the state of the brain interacts with stimulation and ultimately aim to steer and control neural dynamics. The unifying theme across my work is that the effects of brain stimulation depend heavily on the state of the brain receiving it. My dissertation uses a closed-loop phase-locked EEG-TMS system to ask whether frontomedial theta causally configures visual working memory storage or acts instead on attention.

I came to neuroscience from computer science, which let me implement and extend our lab’s real-time closed-loop system: low-latency streaming, phase estimation under artifact, timing validation, and hardware synchronization. Where I want to take this work next is control rather than triggering, using stimulation as a control input that steers the brain toward a target state and holds it there.

Publications

  1. Kim, B., & Medaglia, J. D. (2026). Frontoparietal control-default mode connectivity predicts TMS effects on cognitive control Imaging Neuroscience, 4, IMAG.a.1298.
  2. Kim, B., & Medaglia, J. D. (In press). Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation in Cognitive Neuroscience. Cognitive Neuroscience Methods. New York: Springer Nature.
  3. Erickson, B., Kim, B., Sabes, P., Rich, R., Hatcher, A., Fernandez-Nuñez, G., Mentzelopoulos, G., Vitale, F., & Medaglia, J. (2024). TMS-induced phase resets depend on TMS intensity and EEG phase Journal of Neural Engineering, 21(5), 056035.
  4. Erickson, B., Rich, R., Shankar, S., Kim, B., Driscoll, N., Mentzelopoulos, G., Fernandez-Nuñez, G., Vitale, F., & Medaglia, J. D. (2024). Evaluating and benchmarking the EEG signal quality of high-density, dry MXene-based electrode arrays against gelled Ag/AgCl electrodes Journal of Neural Engineering, 21(1), 016005.
  5. Kim, B., Erickson, B. A., Fernandez-Nunez, G., Rich, R., Mentzelopoulos, G., Vitale, F., & Medaglia, J. D. (2023). EEG Phase Can Be Predicted with Similar Accuracy across Cognitive States after Accounting for Power and Signal-to-Noise Ratio eNeuro, 10(9), ENEURO.0050-23.2023.
  6. Mentzelopoulos, G., Driscoll, N., Shankar, S., Kim, B., Rich, R., Fernandez-Nunez, G., Stoll, H., Erickson, B., Medaglia, J. D., & Vitale, F. (2023). Alerting attention is sufficient to induce a phase-dependent behavior that can be predicted by frontal EEG Frontiers in Behavioral Neuroscience, 17.
  7. Kim, B., Niu, X., & Zhang, F. (2023). Functional connectivity strength and topology differences in social phobia adolescents with and without ADHD comorbidity Neuropsychologia, 178, 108418.
  8. Erickson, B. A., Kim, B., Deck, B. L., Pustina, D., DeMarco, A. T., Dickens, J. V., Kelkar, A. S., Turkeltaub, P. E., & Medaglia, J. D. (2022). Preserved anatomical bypasses predict variance in language functions after stroke Cortex.
  9. Ismailescu, D., & Kim, B. (2014). Packing and Covering with Centrally Symmetric Convex Disks Discrete & Computational Geometry, 51(2), 495–508.

Portfolio

In The Loop

iOS & Android app · Solo developer · 2026

In The Loop is a relationship companion app I designed and built for iOS and Android. The premise is that the hard part of keeping up with people isn’t caring about them, it’s remembering: the follow-up you promised, the interview that was coming up, the name of someone’s new city. The app takes on the remembering and reminding so that you can show up more consistently and meaningfully.

After an interaction, you capture what happened by voice or a quick note. AI will parse that message and extract follow-ups, life events, and important dates, then will send reminders at the appropriate time. On top of that is a chat-bot functionality that can give pertinent advice based on that memory: how to introduce two friends who just moved to the same city, how to open a hard conversation, how to support someone through a rough stretch.

I built the whole thing end to end: the cross-platform mobile client, the backend and data model, the LLM pipeline that turns unstructured voice notes into durable structured records, the notification logic, and the marketing site. It is live on both the App Store and Google Play.

Contact