Computation of instinctive escape

Host

Zach Mainen, PhD, Systems Neuroscience Lab

Venue

Seminar Room

Abstract

Brains have evolved to solve the challenges of surviving. From the innate reaction of a prey to the sight of a predator to the use of tools for obtaining food, the brain continuously acquires, stores and uses information to generate adaptive behaviours.

Our goal is to understand how neurons in the brain compute behaviours that promote survival. We want to explain how adaptive behaviours are chosen and executed to succeed in what Darwin called the struggle for existence. We aim to produce mechanistic models of how neurons integrate sensory information, experience and innate drives to generate behaviour, and we are particularly interested in determining the role of synaptic and ion-channel mechanisms in this process.

Bio

Tiago Branco studied Medicine in Lisbon and then completed a PhD at UCL with Yukiko Goda, working on synaptic release probability. He did his postdoctoral research with Michael Hausser, where he investigated how single neurons integrate different spatiotemporal patterns of synaptic input, elucidating the role of dendritic active mechanisms in this process. He then spent one year as a visiting scientist at the Janelia Research Campus, collaborating with Scott Sternson on projects on synaptic integration in hypothalamic neurons that control feeding behaviour. 

Tiago’s lab started in 2013 at the MRC Laboratory of Molecular Biology and moved to the Sainsbury Wellcome Centre in 2016. The main research interest is to understand how instinctive decisions are computed from sensory information, and from representations of the world built from experience. Using a top-down approach to study how ion channels and synapses give rise to the neural dynamics that govern behavioural choices, the main goal of the lab is to build realistic mechanistic models of the computations that support instinctive decision making.

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About the CR Colloquia Series

Champalimaud Research (CR) Colloquia Series is a seminar programme organised by the Champalimaud Centre for the Unknown to promote the discussion about the most interesting and significant questions in neuroscience and physiology & cancer with appointed speakers by the CR Community.