Professor at the CERVO research centre, neurologist and clinical professor at the Centre du Cerveau of the CHU of Liège, Director of Research at the FNRS, Steven Laureys headed, until early 2020, the Coma Science Group that he created in 2014 within the GIGA Consciousness centre at the University of Liège. Most of his research work is devoted to the study of alterations in consciousness in severely brain-damaged patients (coma, vegetative state/non-responsive arousal, minimally conscious state, locked-in syndrome), as well as during anaesthesia, sleep, meditation and in the hypnotic state.

Steven Laureys is the author of over 450 scientific articles, some of which have been published in the most prestigious journals, including Science, Lancet, PNAS and Nature Review Neuroscience. In 2005, he published a book entitled "The Boundaries of Consciousness" with Elsevier. His second book, The Neurology of Consciousness, was published in 2008.

In 2015, he wrote "Un si brillant cerveau - les états limites de conscience" (Editions Odile Jacob) and in 2019 "La méditation, c'est bon pour le cerveau" (Editions Odile Jacob), books aimed at the general public, both best-sellers.

Winner of numerous scientific awards, including the Francqui Prize (2017) - Belgium's most prestigious scientific prize - and the Generet Prize (2019), Steven Laureys is undoubtedly one of the world's leading specialists on the issue of altered states.