QUANTITATIVE LIFE SCIENCES GUEST SEMINAR - 3 May

[Quantitative Life Sciences]

QUANTITATIVE LIFE SCIENCES GUEST SEMINAR

Tuesday, 3 May at 14:00

ICTP, Central Area, 2nd floor, old SISSA building

Speaker: Cristina Savin - Institute of Science and Technology - IST 
Austria, Klosterneuburg

Title: " New tricks for old problems: using maximum entropy models to 
study hippocampal memory"

Abstract:
Understanding how memory and learning happen at the level of neural 
circuits is one of the fundamental questions in neuroscience, with broad 
implications ranging from education, to neuroprosthetics or 
brain-machine interfaces. The contribution of the hippocampus to the 
formation of new memories and memory recall has been investigated 
extensively, both experimentally and in theoretical models. Nonetheless, 
putting together the pieces of the memory puzzle remains a challenge.

During the talk I’ll use a two examples from my recent work to 
illustrate how ideas from machine learning and statistical physics, in 
particular maximum entropy models, can provide novel insights into the 
contributions of the hippocampus to learning and memory. First, I’ll 
discuss a new approach for characterising the statistical structure of 
neural activity and it’s changes during learning.  Second, I’ll 
introduce a top-down framework for studying memory recall at the level 
of neural circuits, which provides computationally 
well-founded links across scales, from single synapses, to the 
integration of signals in the dendritic arbor, to circuit dynamics, to 
the system's level architecture of the brain and to behavior.

Web page: http://indico.ictp.it/event/7863/

-- 
Erica Sarnataro
Group Secretary
Quantitative Life Sciences
The Abdus Salam International Centre for Theoretical Physics (ICTP)
Trieste,  Italy
Tel. +39-040-2240623
e-mail: qls at ictp.it