Mengsen Zhang

Mengsen Zhang is an Assistant Professor at Michigan State University (MSU) in the Department of Computational Mathematics, Science and Engineering and the Neuroscience Program. She bridges complex systems science, neuroscience, computational mathematics, and topological data analysis (TDA) to study brain dynamics and coordination mechanisms across scales.

• Education: B.S. in Psychology and Pharmaceutical Sciences (Peking University); M.S. in Criminology (University of Pennsylvania); Ph.D. in Complex Systems and Brain Sciences (Florida Atlantic University, with Drs. Emmanuelle Tognoli and J. A. Scott Kelso).
• Postdoctoral Training: Stanford University (with Dr. Manish Saggar) and University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill (with Dr. Flavio Frohlich).

Her research focuses on the intersection of topological data analysis and dynamical systems, particularly in understanding brain oscillations, neural networks, and social coordination dynamics. She explores how third-party interventions can stabilize or disrupt coordination in biological and social systems, using both empirical and theoretical approaches.

Her recent publications (2022–2025) highlight applications of transcranial alternating current stimulation (tACS) in psychiatric disorders, metastability in brain dynamics, and novel computational methods for analyzing neural and behavioral data. These works span neuroscience, psychiatry, and computational modeling.

She teaches courses such as CMSE 381: Fundamentals of Data Science Methods (MSU) and STT 381: Fundamentals of Data Science Methods, integrating computational tools into academic training.