About
Ana Jakovljevic
I am a scientist and an artist, moving between neuroscience, microscopy, image analysis, and visual storytelling. In the lab I study structures that shape brain plasticity; in my visual work I translate complex biological forms into images that can be understood, questioned, and remembered.
I work between science and art: one asks me to understand complexity of the living world, the other to give complexity a visible form.
My research focuses on perineuronal nets, extracellular matrix structures that wrap around certain neurons and influence brain plasticity. Under the microscope they appear as a mesh: a visible pattern that can change with stimulation, stress, development, or disease. That is why images are central to my work. They are not only illustrations of a result; often, they are the result.
My practice combines confocal and super-resolution microscopy, tissue and cell preparation, fluorescence labeling, quantitative image analysis, figure-making, painting, anatomical drawing, and scientific illustration. I use tools such as FIJI/ImageJ, IMARIS, Python, and SPSS, but the biological question comes first. What I care about is the full path from structure to meaning: what an image reveals, what it hides, and how it can carry a scientific argument without losing its visual force.
Get in touch
Happy to hear from collaborators, students, and anyone working with microscopy images.