Assist.-Prof. Isabella Anderson-Wagner
Assistant Professor, joint professorship with the Centre for Microbiology and Environmental Systems Science, Faculty of Psychology, and Vienna Cognitive Science Hub
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✉ isabella.wagner(at)univie.ac.at
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Research Profiles
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Isabella Wagner‘s research focuses on interactions at the interface of the brain, cognition, and the gut microbiome. Specifically, her team’s work aims at elucidating how the gut microbiome affects neural plasticity, learning and memory. To assess brain function, her team uses magnetic resonance imaging and spectroscopy, combined with advanced analysis methods such as brain connectivity and multivariate pattern techniques.
Isabella was awarded the Cortex Prize for her early career achievements in neuroscience by the Federation of European Neuroscience Societies (2023). She has received a Veni Grant from the Dutch Research Council (2020) and an FWF Stand-Alone Grant (2021). Recently, she was awarded a Young Investigator Grant from the Brain & Behaviour Research Foundation to elucidate the role of gut bacteria in stress and genetic predisposition for dementia (2023), and an FWF grant to investigate premature infant health (2023).
Publications
Graichen LP, Linder MS, Keuter L, Jensen O, Doeller C, Lamm C et al. Entorhinal grid-like codes for visual space during memory formation. Nature Communications. 2025 Oct 20;16(1):9247. doi: 10.1038/s41467-025-64307-z
Karner T, Forbes PAG, Berry D, Wagner IC. Gut microbial diversity and inferred capacity to produce butyrate modulate cortisol reactivity following acute stress in healthy adults. bioRxiv. 2025 Jun 25. doi: 10.1101/2025.06.24.661294
Schoch S, Berry D, Kohn N, Dresler M, Anderson-Wagner I. Sleep and gut microbiome composition in healthy adults (Registered Report). 2025 Jun 3. doi: 10.17605/OSF.IO/F9PAQ
Ren J, Konrad BN, Zhu Y, Li F, Czisch M, Dresler M et al. Method of loci training yields unique neural representations that support effective memory encoding. bioRxiv. 2025 Feb 25. doi: 10.1101/2025.02.24.639840
Boch M, Karl S, Wagner IC, Lengersdorff LL, Huber L, Lamm C. Action observation reveals a network with divergent temporal and parietal cortex engagement in dogs compared with humans. Imaging Neuroscience. 2024 Dec 11;2:1-29. Epub 2024 Nov 20. doi: 10.1162/imag_a_00385
Microbiomes Drive Planetary Health
Isabella Anderson-Wagner is part of the FWF-funded Cluster of Excellence (CoE)

