She received her MD and PhD from Hacettepe University in Turkey. She worked as a postdoctoral fellow in Peter H. Reinhart's laboratory at Duke University and Dr. George W. Huntley's laboratory at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai. Her overall research goal is to understand the mechanisms of synaptic plasticity and remodeling in the nervous system and the role of these processes in neurodegenerative disorders. She uses electrophysiological techniques for recording of neural activity in vivo, in brain slice preparations in vitro, and from dissociated neuronal cultures, as well as collaborative methods including biochemical, molecular biological, and imaging techniques.