Dear BERGers,

This week at BERG our speaker is Bill Phillips who will be giving a presentation entitled:

“Subcellular and microcircuit foundations of information processing in the neocortex: Recent comparisons between humans, monkeys, and rodents”

To get you all interested and your thinking caps on, Bill has sent me the following abstract for his talk:

Abstract: Mammalian neocortex has expanded greatly in size and number of specialized regions during the course of evolution. Why? What is its special magic? What are the common information processing capabilities that make it useful to such a wide diversity of species and ecological niches? How do its capabilities vary across species and cortical regions? Are there any distinctive capabilities of human neocortex? Recent discoveries indicate that the ability of neocortical pyramidal cells to select and amplify currently relevant signals varies greatly both within and across species. Selective amplification at the neuronal level is important because it is central to the conscious cognitive decisions that determine what is perceived, thought, and done, with major implications for development and psychopathology. We established the formal information theory of selective amplification long ago, and are currently studying its implications for machine learning. Potential synergies between this research and that of BERG await exploration.

Our meeting is at the usual time and venue: 5.30 p.m. in the Common Room (3A94), with drinks and nibbles provided as always.

Our schedule for this Spring Semester is almost complete but we still have one available date, Wednesday 20^th March 2019. Would somebody like to do the honours and sign up for this date? Please do so using our Doodle Poll at: https://doodle.com/poll/shw5nppymad8e8b7

If you have students who might wish to be on the BERG mailing list, please send them this e-mail. To sign up to the BERG mailing list please use the following link: http://lists.stir.ac.uk/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/berg
(You can also use this link to unsubscribe)
https://stir.box.com/s/rwzik2tsai3kausdtekqvgayv34otmgt

An up to date copy of our schedule can be found at: https://stir.app.box.com/file/379199974874

See you all on Wednesday.

Best Wishes,

Deborah