Yarmo Mackenbach

FOSS developer, M.Sc. in Neuroscience

Details

Nationality: Dutch
Email: contact@yarmo.eu
Website: https://yarmo.eu

Profile

I'm a 30 year old Free and Open Source Software (FOSS) developer currently working on Keyoxide, a platform for decentralized online identities. I've also finished a PhD project in the field of Neurosciences focused on the neuronal basis of directional hearing. In my free time, I like to tinker with electronics (arduino, raspberry pi) and my homelab (server with networking, storage), play piano, produce music, fiddle with my modular synthesizer, hike and go kayaking.

Experience

Keyoxide: FOSS project lead

Europe
2020-present

Keyoxide aims to be a novel online social identity verification platform based on cryptography.
As a one person project, it is my role to lead the project and set its course, develop the different libraries in different languages, design and implement the user interfaces and write documentation, specifications, perform outreach, review contributions from other developers, provide user support and apply for funding.

PhD in Fundamental Auditory Research

Erasmus MC, Rotterdam, The Netherlands
2015-2019

In this project, we study the relationship between input and output of individual Medial Superior Olive cells responsible for the localization of sound. These cells are among the fastest neurons in the brain, operating with a temporal resolution high enough to detect sub-millisecond time differences. Combining a custom novel auditory stimulus and spectral/circular statistics analysis tools programmed specifically for this stimulus, we investigate how dendritic signals interact and generate spikes.

It was my role to lead the project, design the experiments and perform them, analyse the data, write the results and conclusions and present the findings at conferences in the Netherlands and overseas.

Key achievements:
Improved surgery and longevity of experiments
Designed a novel auditory stimulus and analysis tools
Designed a remote-controlled cell patching system
Set up database & data management workflow

Education

B.Sc. Biology

Université Victor Segalen, Bordeaux, France
2010-2013

M.Sc. Neurosciences et

Neuropsychopharmacology

Université Victor Segalen, Bordeaux, France
2013-2015

M.Sc. Cellular & Molecular Biology

Universidade de Coimbra, Portugal
2013-2015

Extra-curricular courses

Machine Learning - Andrew Ng (Stanford & Coursera)

Expertise

Project management
Programming & automation
Data management & analysis
Scientific reasoning
Hosting online services
Open source/science advocate

Skills

Languages

Dutch+++++
English+++++
French+++++
Portuguese++···

General skills

Communication (writing, posters & presentations)
Playing music with others (band, jams)

Organisational skills

Was part of the organizing committees for the Brain Awareness Week Rotterdam events of 2017 and 2018, both attended by 200+ people. Was part of organizing committees for the ONWAR PhD retreats of 2016 and 2017, both attended by 100+ PhD students.

Scientific skills

In vivo electrophysiology
Histology
Behavioral techniques
Data analysis (Matlab)
Neuron modelling (neuron)
Spectral analysis (Fourier, power)
Circular statistics (vector strength, Rayleigh)

Tech skills

Programming & data analysis
SQL Database management (MySQL, mariaDB)
NoSQL Database management (neo4j)
Version control systems (git, svn)
Website programming (HTML, JS, CSS)
Server side scripting (NodeJS, PHP)
System scripting (Rust)
Automation & workflow design (bash, perl, python)
Arduino/raspberry pi programming (C/python)
Networking (routing, reverse proxy, ssh)
Mesh overlay network (wireguard, tailscale)
Application containerization (docker)
Cloud-based virtual private servers (DigitalOcean, Hetzner)
Contributing to the open-source ecosystem
Artificial intelligence / machine learning
Decentralized & federated web 3.0

Publications

Pregnenolone blocks cannabinoid-induced acute psychotic-like states in mice. Busquets-Garcia, A., Soria-Gómez, E., Redon, B. et al. Molecular Psychiatry (2017)
DOI: 10.1038/mp.2017.4