Hi! ^.^

My name is Danbee (단비), which in Korean means (literally) “sweet rain” and (idiomatically) “rain that comes at just the right moment”.

I’m a queer Korean-American field neuroscientist, storyteller, dancer, and dreamer who spends a lot of time thinking about anatomy, movement, empowerment, community building, re-indigenisation, diasporas, and the ocean. I love being in the wilderness, especially in the mountains and by the sea.

I love exploring and strengthening connections across many different topics, as a way to collaborate and share insights. I especially enjoy crafting multi-sensory interactive experiences, and my heart’s work is nurturing and stewarding intergenerational communities for collective, free-choice learning. My passion for this work began when I participated in Terrascope, a freshman seminar course at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. I continued my participation in Terrascope, first as an Undergraduate Teaching Fellow, then as an Alumni Mentor.

Since 2010, I’ve organized and taught for the Appalachian Institute for Creative Learning, a summer enrichment camp for rising 3rd through 12th graders established in 1981 in the southern Appalachia region of the US. In 2018 I co-founded Neuronautas, a summer intensive field neuroscience program for teenagers in Portugal.

My dream futures are full of radical, joyful villages of creative and cooperative people passionate about lifelong learning and mutual benefit. I believe that empowering everyone to study nervous systems in their daily lives and making neuroscience research as accessible as possible through excellent storytelling is an important part of achieving this future.

I got hooked on the neuroscience of storytelling while co-writing and choreographing an original musical called Hack, Punt, Tool (you can watch the 2017 production on YouTube). Since then I’ve written and performed a set of original “science songs”; created an interactive aquarium exhibit that collected neuroscience data from over 24,000 visitors; and self-published a YA sci-fi graphic novel called The First VIRS.

I am currently based in the UK, but I travel often in order to also be in community with loved ones in the US and Portugal.

If you would like to get in touch, please email me at danbee[at]alum[dot]mit[dot]edu.

Curriculum Vitae