Neuroscientists Talk Shop

Arnold Kriegstein (UCSF) discusses differences in proliferative zones of human and mouse, and his group's discovery of a novel class of neurogenic radial glia in the outer subventricular zone of human neocortex, which  may have provided a critical evolutionary step underlying increased  cortical size and complexity in the human brain. Duration: 43 minutes Discussants:(in alphabetica...

Friday, December 6, 2013 In December 2013, The UTSA Neurosciences institute assembled a group of premier biophysicists to discuss "Power Law Dynamics in the Brain."   Recorded after the day's talks, this episode has Charlie Wilson (UTSA) leading the group in covering a wide range of topics on scale-invariant network dynamics as they relate to neural systems, including consideration...

Thursday, December 5, 2013 Louis  Reichardt (UCSF/Simons Foundation Autism Research Initiative) discusses his techniques driven neuroscience, and his thoughts on moving heading the SFAR). Duration: 35 minutes Discussants:(in alphabetical order) Gerard Beaudoin (Res Asst Prof, UTSA) Gary Gaufo (Assoc Prof, UTSA) Annie Lin (Assoc Prof, UTSA) Charles Wilson (Professor, UTSA) acknowledgement: JM...

Thursday, November 21, 2013 Lena Ting (Georgia Tech/ Emory) discusses her biomechanical approach for understanding neural control of motor systems. Duration: 42 minutes Discussants:(in alphabetical order) Salma Quraishi (Asst Prof, UTSA) Todd Troyer (Assoc Prof, UTSA) Charles Wilson (Professor, UTSA) acknowledgment: JM Tepper for original music.

Thursday, October 17, 2013 Ellen Lau (University of Maryland) discusses the field of neurolinguistics,  and its approach to neural mechanisms of language.  The group discusses the Wernicke-Geschwind model, and some cognitive scientists' resistance to the idea of prediction as a driving force in language. Duration: 42 minutes Discussants:(in alphabetical order) Salma Quraishi (Asst P...

Thursday, September 19, 2013 Ani Patel (Tufts University) discusses the neuroscience of music, and its overlap with language processing networks.  He describes his OPERA  hypothesis, that describes some of the conditions for plasticity in the brain in response to musical training. Duration: 36 minutes Discussants:(in alphabetical order) Bharath Chandrasekaran (Asst Prof, UT Austin)...

Thursday, September 12, 2013 Eric Fortune (NJIT) discusses the neural bases of cooperative behavior in duetting songbird pairs. Duration: 50 minutes Discussants:(in alphabetical order) Salma Quraishi (Asst Prof, UTSA) Todd Troyer (Assoc Prof, UTSA) Charles Wilson (Prof, UTSA) acknowledgment: JM Tepper for original music.

Thursday, September 5, 2013 Cameron  McIntyre (Case Western Reserve) discusses the idea of being able to  "dose" deep brain stimulation (DBS), and how it is now being used to treat neuropsychiatric disorders like depression. Duration: 41 minutes Discussants:(in alphabetical order) Salma Quraishi (Asst Prof, UTSA) Todd Troyer (Assoc Prof, UTSA) Charles Wilson (Prof, UTSA) acknowledgment:...

Daniel Ansari (University of Western Ontario) discusses the new field of Mind,  Brain and Education (sometimes called Neuroeducation) which seeks to bring evidence based practice and empirical calculation into the field of education research and practice.  He also discusses his work on the mathematical organization of the brain. Duration: 46 minutes Discussants:(in alphabetical...

Thursday, April 18, 2013 Sam Pfaff (HHMI, Salk Institute) discusses the heterogeneity of spinal interneurons, vertebrate neural development, and central pattern generators. Duration: 42 minutes Discussants:(in alphabetical order) Gerard Beaudoin III (Postdoc, UTSA) Gary Gaufo (Assoc Prof, UTSA) Salma Quraishi (Asst Prof, UTSA) Todd Troyer (Assoc Prof, UTSA) Charles Wilson (Prof, UTSA) ac...

Thursday, April 11, 2013 Lee Cox (University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign) discusses some of the challenges in investigating thalamic investigation, the contribution of the thalamus to sensory processing, the significance of rhythmicity in thalamocortical systems; the significance of interneuron species and the curiousness of feedforward and recurrent connectivity. Duration: 42 minutes Discussa...

Thursday, April 4, 2013 Gordon Shepherd (Yale) discusses the idea that all cortical circuitry is based on elaboration of a basic microcircuit.  The group discusses ideas that have shaped the understanding of cortical function, including the cortical column. Duration: 43 minutes Discussants:(in alphabetical order) James Bower (Prof, UTHSCSA) Salma Quraishi (Asst Prof, UTSA) Soom...

Thursday, March 7, 2013 Russell Poldrack (UT Austin) discusses how cognitive fMRI studies are evolving  from a focus on "blobology" to the new emphasis on data mining methods that focus on network connectivity.  He introduces the idea of phenomics as applied to cognitive phenotypes, and the virtues of data sharing in functional studies of cognition. Duration: 38 minutes Discuss...

Thursday, February 28, 2013 Julie Kauer (Brown University) discusses her work on plasticity and addiction, specifically her discovery of the potentiation of GABA  synapses (GABA-LTP) on dopamine neurons. The group discusses how acute drugs and stress produce a persistent block of GABA-LTP, and how this  phenomenon might be significant to behavior, addiction and its relevance &n...

Thursday, February 21, 2013 Barbara Finlay (Cornell University) discusses her comparative brain development database, "Translating Time."  She takes questions from the group regarding the significance of comparing developmental events across species, and talks about applying an evo-devo approach to questions of cognition. Duration: 39 minutes Discussants:(in alphabetical order) Gary...

Thursday, February 7, 2013 Jocubas Ziburkus (University of Houston) talks about in vitro models of epilepsy, both pharmacological and genetic, and the role of inhibitory interneurons and neuromodulators in seizure mechanics. Duration: 53 minutes Discussants:(in alphabetical order) Salma Quraishi (Asst Prof, UTSA) Todd Troyer (Asst Prof, UTSA) Charles Wilson (Prof, UTSA) acknowledgement:...

Thursday, January 31, 2013 William Armstrong (University of Tennessee Health Sciences Center) talks about developing the intracellular biocytin labeling technique.  This is a follow up to our 2008 talk with Bill (episode 15), when he told us about functional studies of neurosecretary cells of the supraoptic and paraventricular nuclei of the hypothalamus. Duration: 53 minutes Discuss...

Thursday, November 15, 2012 Simon Giszter (Drexel School of Medicine) discusses spinal cord modularity based on the idea of motor primitives as optimization learning constraints that can be flexibly modulated by cortical inputs.  He discusses ideas about the origins of motor primitives (are they built by evolution at the level of the species or online at the level of the task for individuals)...

Thursday, September 27, 2012 Mark Laubach (Yale School of Medicine) discusses mouse frontal cortex as a model for human frontal cortical function.  He talks about the anterior cingulate cortex as an area in the context of performance monitoring and adaptive control. Duration: 29 minutes Discussants:(in alphabetical order) Carlos Paladini (Assoc Prof, UTSA) Salma Quraishi (Res Asst Prof,...

Thursday, September 20, 2012 Barry Connors (Brown University) talks about the historical timeline of research on electrical synapses.  He discusses his experimental  exploration of synchrony in cortical interneurons and considers theoretical models of weakly coupled oscillators. Duration: 46 minutes Discussants:(in alphabetical order) Joseph Beatty (Postdoctoral Fellow, UTSA) Salma...

Thursday, April 26, 2012 Anastassios Tzingounis (University of CT) discusses the mysterious slow after-hyperpolarization current, and talks about a candidate component mechanism he has described that involves the calcium sensor hippocalcin.  He also discusses how he is using atomic force microscopy to map changing distributions of ion channels on living cells. Duration: 39 minu...

Tuesday, April 24, 2012 Erich Jarvis (Duke University/HHMI) discusses evolutionary origins of the  vocal motor learning pathway in songbirds, his new work on vocal communication in a new mammalian species, and his spearheading of the Avian Brain Nomenclature forum as a consensus building effort that shaped a decade of avian brain research. Duration: 55 minutes Discussants:(in a...

Thursday, April 19, 2012 Bharath Chandrasekaran (UT Austin) discusses the corticocentric view of cognitive brain research, and how he has optimized of functional imaging techniques for study of auditory and speech processing, and the influence of music training on the development of auditory skills. Duration: 39 minutes Discussants:(in alphabetical order) Salma Quraishi (Res Asst Prof, UTSA)...

Thursday, April 5, 2012 Gordon  Fishell (NYU School of Medicine) discusses developmental interneuron diversity, the debate between the "lumpers" and "splitters", and the possibility of tracing psychiatric disorders to focal genetic origins.  The group assesses approaches for relating molecular genetics to circuits and ultimately behavior. Duration: 55 minutes Discussants:(in alphabe...

Thursday, March 22, 2012 Johannes Schul (Associate Professor, University of Missouri) discusses the the katydid communication system and its unique strategy for sound segregation of behaviorally relevant information, in a discussion hosted by Rama Ratnam. Duration: 39 minutes Discussants:(in alphabetical order) Salma Quraishi (Res Asst Prof, UTSA) Rama Ratnam (Asst Prof, UTSA) Charles Wi...