The Simons Collaboration on the Global Brain (SCGB) hosts postdoc/student meetings to bring together trainees interested in neural coding and dynamics to discuss ideas and data. In addition to regional meetings in New York, Boston, and the Bay Area, SCGB holds a Global virtual series to connect systems and computational neuroscientists across the world. We would love to see you at this month's Global meeting! Please see event details and Zoom link below.

SCGB Global Postdoc/Student Meeting: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/scgb-global-postdocstudent-meeting-tickets-146846340357 

Tuesday, April 27th, 9am Eastern Time 

https://simonsfoundation.zoom.us/j/93633603374?pwd=LytrcVp6MWlPY1dkb2UvbUJWQ3pvQT09  
    Passcode: 989252

C. Ann Duan

SCGB Postdoctoral Fellow, Chinese Academy of Sciences
Incoming Group Leader, Sainsbury Wellcome Centre

Cortical and collicular contributions to decision making in rats and mice

A central goal of behavioral neuroscience is to expose general principles of neural computation that give rise to cognition. Until recently, cognitive functions were thought to mainly rely on cortical areas such as the frontal cortex, while “old” subcortical areas, such as the midbrain superior colliculus (SC), have mostly been associated with sensorimotor processing. Based on these earlier work, we expected the SC to be passively inhibited while animals avoided unwanted reflexive actions. We were surprised to find that the SC played an active and pivotal role in suppressing context-inappropriate behaviors. Since then, my research has focused on understanding how the SC, in coordination with cortex, implements flexible decision making. My talk will cover work in two different decision-making tasks: flexible sensorimotor routing in freely-moving rats and motor planning in head-fixed mice. Using electrophysiology, optogenetics, pathway-specific two-photon calcium imaging, and computational modeling, we found that the SC is particularly important during the memory period in both tasks, when the context information or motor planning signals need to be maintained in the brain in the absence of sensory input and motor output. The participation of SC seems to increase as cognitive demand increases in both behaviors. Together, our experimental and computational work reveal the SC as a key node in the distributed cortico-subcortical network underlying flexible behaviors, and make surprising predictions for how decision making is implemented in brain circuits.

Please note that this meeting is open to all neuroscience postdocs and PhD students, regardless of location or SCGB affiliation (sorry, no PIs). After Q&A with the speaker, we will open breakout rooms for anyone interested in staying to chat, network, or further discuss the talk. In addition to these breakouts, SCGB Scientific Staff will be available for "office hours" to chat and answer questions about SCGB programs and support.
 
Registration on EventBrite is encouraged but not required: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/scgb-global-postdocstudent-meeting-tickets-146846340357 
Please contact Laura Long at llong@simonsfoundation.org with any questions.