Bernadette van Wijk

Bernadette van Wijk is an Associate Professor at the Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, affiliated with the Faculty of Behavioural and Movement Sciences. She holds additional appointments as an Associate Professor in Neurocontrol, the Institute of Biomaterials, Biotechnology and Diagnostics (IBBA), and the Amsterdam Movement Sciences (AMS) - Rehabilitation & Development. Her work contributes to UN Sustainable Development Goals related to health and well-being.

Her research focuses on neural mechanisms underlying motor control and Parkinson's disease, leveraging techniques such as local field potential (LFP) recordings, EEG/MEG, and computational modeling. Key interests include beta oscillations in basal ganglia circuits, adaptive deep brain stimulation (DBS), and sensorimotor integration during movement. She leads courses in Neuroscience and Neurowetenschappen, emphasizing translational research and clinical applications.

Recent articles highlight her contributions to understanding reward-based motor learning, LFP-based physiomarkers in Parkinson’s, and the neural correlates of gait and arm swing. Her work emphasizes methodological rigor, such as artifact suppression in neurophysiological data and optimizing DBS electrode localization.

Dr. van Wijk has supervised one PhD thesis and actively collaborates internationally on projects involving neurophysiology and clinical neuroscience. Her research bridges fundamental science and clinical practice, aiming to improve therapies for movement disorders.