Latest Computational neuroscience Stories
NEW YORK, Dec. 16, 2010 /PRNewswire/ -- NYU Langone Medical Center announced today that it has appointed internationally renowned scientist and leader Richard W. Tsien, DPhil, as the first director of the Neuroscience Institute and the Druckenmiller Professor of Neuroscience, effective January 2012. Dr. Tsien--a member of both the Institute of Medicine and National Academy of Sciences and a former Rhodes Scholar--joins NYU Langone from Stanford University, where he currently serves as the...
Modeling propagating activity wavesThe appearance of a spot of light on the retina causes sudden activation of millions of neurons in the brain within tenths of milliseconds. At the first cortical processing stage, the primary visual cortex, each neuron thereby receives thousands of inputs from both close neighbors and further distant neurons, and also sends-out an equal amount of output to others.During the recent decades, individual characteristics of these widespread network connections...
Research provides insight into developmental disorders, including Williams syndromeScientists at Emory University School of Medicine have uncovered how a structural component inside neurons performs two coordinated dance moves when the connections between neurons are strengthened.The results are published online in the journal Nature Neuroscience, and will appear in a future print issue.In experiments with neurons in culture, the researchers can distinguish two separate steps during long-term...
Researchers at Emory University School of Medicine have identified a potential new strategy for treating fragile X syndrome, the most common inherited cause of intellectual disability.The researchers have found that a class of drugs called phosphoinositide-3 (PI3) kinase inhibitors can correct defects in the anatomy of neurons seen in a mouse model of fragile X syndrome. In experiments with cultured neurons from the hippocampus, a brain region involved in learning and memory, the drugs could...
British researchers are working to develop new, innovative computers by mimicking the way neurons communicate, in hopes the approach will lead to improvements in visual and audio processing, BBC news reported on Friday.Such enhancements could result in computers that can learn to see or to hear, instead of relying upon sensors.The work is simultaneously helping researchers improve their understanding of how nerve cells operate."˜Smart' computingAlthough artificial neural networks have been...
Next time your brain plays tricks on you, you have an excuse: according to new research by UCL scientists published today in the journal Nature, the brain is intrinsically unreliable.This may not seem surprising to most of us, but it has puzzled neuroscientists for decades. Given that the brain is the most powerful computing device known, how can it perform so well even though the behaviour of its circuits is variable?A long-standing hypothesis is that the brain's circuitry actually is...
Learning requires the sophisticated ability to constantly update expectations in order to make accurate predictions about the changing environment. Although a full characterization of how this is orchestrated by the brain remains elusive, a new study published by Cell Press in the May 27 issue of the journal Neuron provides insight into how the human brain may use a combination of two distinct strategies to guide behavior.One accepted learning strategy, called model-free learning, relies on...
Mechanism found that prepares the brain of a newborn for information processingWith their French colleagues, researchers at the University of Helsinki have found a mechanism in the memory centre of newborn that adjusts the maturation of the brain for the information processing required later in life. The study was published this week in an American science magazine The Journal of Neuroscience.The brain cells in the brain of a newborn are still quite loosely interconnected. In the middle of...
With the help of neural networks, in which complex algorithms are used to monitor critical process steps, engineers are paving the way for zero-defect production in the area of metal powder injection molding. The gain for manufacturers is less waste combined with time savings.The metal components used in the hinges of spectacle frames, surgical instruments or artificial heart valves are often very small. For some years now, manufacturers of components with complex geometries of this type have...
With the help of a little singing bird, Penn State physicists are gaining insight into how the human brain functions, which may lead to a better understanding of complex vocal behavior, human speech production and ultimately, speech disorders and related diseases.Dezhe Jin, assistant professor of physics, is looking at how songbirds transmit impulses through nerve cells in the brain to produce a complex behavior, such as singing. Songbirds are particularly well suited for studying speech...
