Why are brains the way they are? Do neural circuits function in an “optimal” way, and if so, in what sense are they optimal? How do brains encode sensory information and form associative memories?

Andrew Lin's lab at the University of Sheffield is seeking postdoctoral research associates to study these fundamental questions in neuroscience in the olfactory system of the fruit fly Drosophila. We aim to discover neuronal plasticity mechanisms that underlie associative memory and the maintenance of optimal sensory coding, in the Drosophila mushroom body (the fly’s olfactory memory centre).

Of special note to the comp-neuro email list, we are particularly looking for at least one of the postdocs we hire to have expertise in computational neuroscience. We seek to tie computational models of what plasticity rules would be ‘optimal’ for memory, with experiments testing whether the real brain actually uses these ‘optimal’ rules.