Neuroscientists Talk Shop

Thursday, January 19, 2017

Leslie Whitaker (NIDA Fellow) talks about how silent synapses in neuronal ensembles might underlie associative learning in the ventral tegmental area and prefrontal cortex.

Duration: 39 minutes

Discussants:(in alphabetical order)

Carlos Paladini (Assoc...

Thursday, January 26, 2017

Henry Yin (Duke) discusses a take on hierarchical movement control based on integrative approaches that marry kinematics and optogenetically controlled behavioral assays.

The discussion references this review and paper:

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/27306757

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih...

Thursday, February 2, 2017

Harel Shouval (UT Health, Houston) discusses building models for how time constants of neural circuits adapt to reflect the time constraints of the world.  For instance, learning requires associating cues and later rewards, yet the teaching signal (the reward) is temporally distant from the cue itself well outside the timescale of individual neurons.

For reference, the discussion touches on these papers.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih...

Thursday, February 9, 2017

Peter Kalivas (Medical University of South Carolina) discusses how he is incorporating the tetrapartite synapse (pre-synapse, post-synapse, glia and extra-cellular matrix) into understanding addiction circuits and behavior...

Thursday, February 16, 2017

Bennet Ibey (Air Force Research Laboratory) discusses the biophysics of how membranes react to electric field pulses.  The discussion centers around our reference point for this phenomenom, electroporation...

Thursday, March 2, 2017

Christiane Linster (Cornell) discusses the theory and experimental realities at play in modeling learning, memory and neuromodulation in the olfactory system of rodents.

Duration: 40 minutes

Discussants:(in alphabetical order)

Salma Quraishi (Res Asst Prof, UTSA)

Todd Troyer (Assoc Prof, UTSA)

Charles Wilson (Ewing Halsell Chair, UTSA)

acknowledgement: JM Tepper for original music.

Nick Hollon (Fellow, Xin Jin Lab, Salk Institute) leads us in a fantastic discussion on neuroeconomic approaches to understanding the neural correlates that govern value-based decision making...

Thursday, March 23, 2017

Gemma Casadesus-Smith (Kent State) discusses new strategies in thinking about Alzheimer’s disease and its prevention, and what we understand about the disease process through clinical indicators.  The group takes on some hard questions about the approaches being used to guide clinical trials, and why some ideas appear to linger past their prime...

Thursday, March 30, 2017

Alan Lerner (Case Western Reserve) offers his perspective as a clinician-scientist in understanding the scope of Brain Health as a “big science” initiative.  He describes how a broad alignment of public health, medical, clinical and basic science perspectives are informing new perspectives on the treatment and prevention of neurodegenerative diseases and dementia...

Thursday, April 6, 2017

James Tepper (Rutgers Newark) joins us 10 years down the line to revisit the topic of our inaugural podcast discussion, which centered on the diversity and origins of striatal interneurons.  A number of the original group are joined by some new faculty to consider how the field has expanded and evolved in the last decade...