DONALD WLODKOWIC LAB

Our research investigates the origins of cognition — how simple organisms sense, navigate, learn, remember, and make adaptive decisions without complex brains.

We study proto-cognitive processes in aquatic and terrestrial invertebrates, from organisms with minimal nervous systems to aneural lifeforms, asking fundamental questions: 

• What are the evolutionary roots of adaptive behaviour? 

• What can organisms with simple nervous systems learn and remember? 

• Can organisms without neurons learn and form memories? 

• What is the minimal biological substrate for intelligence?

Our interest spans diverse model systems spanning placozoans (aneural), xenacoelomorphs and rotifers (minimal nervous systems), planarians, crustaceans, molluscs, and insects exploring phenomena such as habituation, associative conditioning, spatial learning, goal-directed navigation, and memory retention.

We also develop innovative experimental technologies — programmable multisensory behavioral environments, biomicrofluidic platforms, AI-enabled animal tracking, and high-throughput behavioural phenotyping systems — that enable rigorous, quantitative investigation of animal behaviour across species.

Our interdisciplinary approach bridges biology, engineering, and computational analytics, with implications for evolutionary neuroscience, bio-inspired systems, and our fundamental understanding of diverse intelligences.

We also leverage behavioural ecotoxicology approaches to investigate how environmental perturbations disrupt proto-cognitive processes — using pollutants as experimental tools to dissect mechanisms of basal intelligence.