MSc. Pavlos Topalidis

PERSONAL INFORMATION

AddressHellbrunner Straße 34
5020 Salzburg
Austria
+43 (0) 662 – 8044 5143
pavlos.topalidis@plus.ac.at
Webpagewww.sleepscience.at
NationalityGreek

EDUCATION

May 2022 – October 2022 Research Visit at Yale University, CT, USA. Research Topic: Evidence of hippocampal intracranial-electroencephalography engagement in memory recall and statistical learning of visuo-motor associations. Supervisor: Prof. Nicholas Turk-Browne.
since October 2019Student of the Doctoral College “Imaging the Mind” funded by the FWF Austrian Science Fund, University of Salzburg, Austria.
since October 2019Ph.D. student at University of Salzburg, Austria, Centre for Cognitive Neuroscience (CCNS), laboratory for „Sleep and Consciousness Research“. Supervisor: Univ.-Prof. Dr. Manuel Schabus.
October 2017 –
September 2019
M.Sc. Neuro-Cognitive Psychology, Elite Network of Bavaria Program, Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität (LMU), Munich, Germany. Master thesis at Max-Planck Institute of Psychiatry on „The relationship between objective sleep and activity measures and symptomatology in a sample of healthy controls and patients with mood and anxiety disorders“. Supervisors: Prof. Paul Sauseng & Dr. Victor Spoormaker.
October 2013 – June 2014B.Sc. Psychology, Justus-Liebig-University, Giessen, Germany. Erasmus Scholarship.
September 2012 – June 2016B.Sc. (Hons, first class) Psychology, University of Aberdeen, UK. Bachelor thesis topic: „The Visual Influence of Ostracism“. Supervisors: Prof. Neil Macrae & Prof. Arash Sahraie.
2008-20113rd High School of Katerini, Greece.

RESEARCH  & TEACHING EXPERIENCE

October 2023 – June 2024 Junior Lecturer at University of Salzburg, teaching about Human Cognition and Sleep, at Bachelor (BSc.) and Masters (MSc.) level.
August 2018 – May 2019Research Assistant at the faculty of Psychiatry and Psychotherapy at Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität (LMU) in collaboration with the German institute of Brain Stimulation (GCBS). Studied cognitive functions of depression and schizophrenia patients, using fMRI and transcranial Direct Current Stimulation (tDCS). Supervisors: Dr. Daniel Keeser & Prof. Frank Padberg.
November 2018-
July 2019
Research Assistant at the faculty of General & Experimental Psychology, at LMU. Studied the interplay of bottom-up and top-down processes in a visual search paradigm. Supervisors: Prof. Dr. Hermann Mueller & Dr. Marian Sauter.

AWARDS & SCHOLARSHIPS

February 2023Poster award at Sleep, Cognition and Consciousness Winter Symposium, Werfenweng, Austria. Poster title: Searching for predictive codes during sleep: Preliminary results of a full-night E/MEG study
November 2022Salzburg University research stay funding (1700€) at Yale University, USA.
October 2022Shortlisted for best poster award at the 26th European Sleep Research Society Conference, Athens, Greece. Poster Title: Decoding of auditory low-level stimulus properties and higher-order statistics in wakefulness and sleep
September 2021European Sleep Research Society (ESRS) 3rd Sleep School “Function of Sleep”, first price project presentation award in “Predictive Coding during Sleep”, Vrejus, France. press release
October 2013ERASMUS scholarship at Justus-Liebig-Universität, Gießen, Germany.

INTERNSHIPS & TRAININGS

30th March 2023 Cognitive behavioural therapy for insomnia (CBT-I), Deutsche Gesellschaft für Schlafforschung und Schlafmedizin e.V.
May 2022CITI Program: Good Clinical Practice (US FDA focus) – 48879523 – Under requirements set by Yale University.
May 2022CITI Program: Social-Behavioral-Educational program for Researchers – Basic/Refresher – Under requirements set by Yale University.
June 2015Trainee psychologist at the Mental Health Centre, Katerini, Greece.
Supervisor: Ms Nota Voura, M.Sc.
November 2016-
August 2017
Psychologist & Mental Health counsellor at the Hellenic Military Force, Greece (Health Care division).

PUBLICATIONS

2023b Topalidis, P. I., Baron, S., Heib, D. P., Eigl, E. S., Hinterberger, A., & Schabus, M. (2023). From Pulses to Sleep Stages: Towards Optimised Sleep Classification Using Heart-Rate Variability. Sensors.
2023Eigl, E. S., Hauser, T., Topalidis, P. I., & Schabus, M. (2023). On the efficacy of a CBT-I-based online program for sleep problems: a randomized controlled trial. Clocks & Sleep, 5(4), 590-603.
2023aTopalidis, P., Heib, D. P., Baron, S., Eigl, E. S., Hinterberger, A., & Schabus, M. (2023). The Virtual Sleep Lab—A Novel Method for Accurate Four-Class Sleep Staging Using Heart-Rate Variability from Low-Cost Wearables. Sensors, 23(5), 2390.
2021Topalidis, P., Florea, C., Eigl, E-S., M., Kurapov, A., Leon, C. A. B., & Schabus, M. (2021). Evaluation of a Low-Cost Commercial Actigraph and Its Potential Use in Detecting Cultural Variations in Physical Activity and Sleep. Sensors. https://doi.org/10.3390/s21113774
2021Florea, C., Topalidis, P., Hauser, T., Angerer, M., Kurapov, A., Leon, C. A. B., … & Schabus, M. (2021). Sleep during COVID-19 lockdown: A cross-cultural study investigating job system relevance. Biochemical Pharmacology, 114463. Video Abstract.
2020Topalidis, P., Zinchenko, A., Gädeke, J. C., & Föcker, J. (2020). The role of spatial selective attention in the processing of affective prosodies in congenitally blind adults: An ERP study. Brain Research, 146819.
2020Pöhlchen, D., Leuchs, L., Binder, F. P., Blaskovich, B., Nantawisarakul, T., Topalidis, P., … & Czisch, M. (2020). No robust differences in fear conditioning between patients with fear-related disorders and healthy controls. Behaviour Research and Therapy, 103610.
2017Golubickis, M., Sahraie, A., Hunt, R., Visokomogilski, A., Topalidis, P., & Macrae, N. (2017). The visual influence of ostracism. European Journal of Social Psychology, 48(2), 0182-0188.
2015Macrae, N., Mitchell, P., Tait, A., McNamara, L., Golubickis, M., Topalidis, P., & Christian, M. (2015). Turning I into me: Imagining your future self. Consciousness and Cognition, 37, 207-213.

POSTER PRESENTATIONS

December 2023 Topalidis, I., P., Eigl, E., Hinterberger A., & Schabus, M. (2023,12). Preliminary results of a 6-week single-blind online CBT-I program on daily subjective and objective sleep parameters, DGSM, Berlin, Germany.
October 2023 Topalidis, P., Malgorzata, W., Weisz, N., Schabus, M. (2023,10). Neural signals of predictive codes in sleep: implicit grammar learning in a full night E/MEG study. World Sleep Conference, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.
October 2023Topalidis, P., Heib, D., Baron, S., Eigl, E., Hinterberger, A., & Schabus, M (2023,10). From Pulses to Sleep Stages: using Heart-Rate Variability from Low-Cost Wearable Devices for Accurate four-class sleep stage classification. World Sleep Conference, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.
July 2023Topalidis, P., Malgorzata, W., Weisz, N., Schabus, M. (2023,02). The brain implicitly distinguishes random from predictable syllables during an auditory statistical learning task. Does the same happen during sleep? Salzburg Mind-Brain Annual Meeting, Salzburg, Austria.
June 2023Topalidis, P., Heib, D., Baron, S., Eigl, E., Hinterberger, A., & Schabus, M (2023,06). The Virtual Sleep Lab: A Novel Method for Accurate Four-Class Sleep Staging Using Heart-Rate Variability from Low-Cost Wearables. ASRA conference (Österreichische Gesellschaft für Schlafmedizin und Schlafforschung), Linz, Austria.
February 2023Topalidis, P., Malgorzata, W., Weisz, N., Schabus, M. (2023,02). The brain distinguishes random from predictable syllables during implicit grammar learning. To what extent does An E/MEG study. Winter Symposium, Werfenweng, Austria
October 2022Topalidis, P., Reisinger, L., Schubert, J., Weisz, N., & Schabus, M. (2022, 10). Decoding of auditory low-level stimulus properties and higher-order statistics in wakefullness and sleep. 26th conference of the European Sleep Research Society, Athens, Greece
July 2022Topalidis, P., Reisinger, L, Schubert, J., Weisz, N., & Schabus, M. (2022, 03). Processing of random and predictable tone sequences in wakefulness and sleep. World Sleep Conference, Rome, Italy.
July 2022Topalidis, P., Reisinger, L., & Schabus, M. (2021, 07). Decoding of higher-order auditory sequence statistics during sleep: pilot results. Salzburg Annual Brain Meeting (SAMBA). Online event.
September 2020 Topalidis, P., Ameen, M., Hauser, T., Heib, D., & Schabus, M. (2020, 07). Investigating top-down processing from wakefulness to sleep: behavioural results of a novel auditory paradigm in wakefulness. 25th conference of the European Sleep Research Society. Online Event.
November 2019Topalidis, P., Ameen, M., Hauser, T., Heib, D., & Schabus M. (2019,11)
Generating predictions during sleep: Investigating top-down processing during sleep, Neuroscience Day, Salzburg, Austria.
April 2018Topalidis, P., Schenk, T., Röder, B., & Föcker, J. (2018, 05). Is the processing of affective prosody influenced by spatial attention in congenitally blind individuals? 4th Conference of Visual Search and Selective Attetnion (VSSA), Ammersee, Germany.

 METHODS & SOFTWARE SKILLS

Data Acquisition Encephalography (EEG); Polysomnography (PSG); Magnetoencephalography (MEG); Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI); Reaction times/Behavioural Data; Intracranial EEG; Actigraphy
Data ProcessingBrainstorm (Beginner); EEGlab (Beginner); Fieldtrip (Advanced).
Data AnalysisEvent-related Potentials (ERPs); Time-Frequency Analysis; Multilevel Pattern Analysis (MVPA); Data cleaning; Data manipulation;
Programming LanguagesMatlab (Advanced); R (Advanced); Python (Beginner), SQL (Beginner)
Experimental ControlPsychotoolbox-Matlab (Beginner)
Scientific ReportingRMarkdown; Reproducible science articles package.

RESEARCH INTEREST

  • Sleep, Cognition & Consciousness.
  • Information processing during sleep; Predictive coding & Statistical learning in wakefulness and sleep. Interpretations of oscillatory brain activity and potential applications.
  • Sleep Monitoring; Wearables; Sleep health; Insomnia; Cultural Variations in Sleep.
  • Psychophysiology: using physiological measures to index mental states.
  • Science Communication: finding intuitive ways to communicate complex concepts.