Cigdem has had an extensive career in neuroscience and is an expert on sleep and the electroencephalogram (EEG). She trained as a veterinary surgeon in Turkey and subsequently obtained a master's degree in Paris. After working as a vet for a period, she undertook her PhD at KCL in psychiatric genetics. Subsequently, Cigdem worked on sleep with Professor Bill Wisden and Professor Nick Franks at Imperial College London, before working in the laboratory of Professor Paul Francis at KCL on dementia models. She then joined the Cooke lab, where she introduced methods to measure EEG in freely moving animals during wake and sleep. Cigdem used these approaches to characterise differences in the frequency domain in resting state EEG from mouse models of Fragile X Syndrome and Tuberous Sclerosis Complex. She then moved to University College London to work with Professor Lorenzo Fabrizi and Dr Kimberley Whitehead on EEG in neonates. More recently, Cigdem has moved to Birkbeck University where she works with Professor Emily Jones on EEG in infants and continues to collaborate extensively with the Cooke lab. In addition, Cigdem does some of her own consultancy work based in her expertise on EEG analysis and sleep.