Reposted by Bill Podlaski
Let's talk about "grumpy lab person". Many labs have them. With an eye to keeping science at its most rigorous, they cross the line into criticism that's too harsh. They are the ones who risk killing your scientific spirit. They are reviewer 2. /1
January 21, 2026 at 8:36 AM
Let's talk about "grumpy lab person". Many labs have them. With an eye to keeping science at its most rigorous, they cross the line into criticism that's too harsh. They are the ones who risk killing your scientific spirit. They are reviewer 2. /1
Reposted by Bill Podlaski
📢 Applications open on 19 Jan for the 7-week #Mathematics #SummerSchool in London. You will develop the maths skills and intuition necessary to enter the #TheoreticalNeuroscience / #MachineLearning field.
Find out more & register for the information webinar 👉 www.ucl.ac.uk/life-science...
Find out more & register for the information webinar 👉 www.ucl.ac.uk/life-science...
January 15, 2026 at 2:37 PM
📢 Applications open on 19 Jan for the 7-week #Mathematics #SummerSchool in London. You will develop the maths skills and intuition necessary to enter the #TheoreticalNeuroscience / #MachineLearning field.
Find out more & register for the information webinar 👉 www.ucl.ac.uk/life-science...
Find out more & register for the information webinar 👉 www.ucl.ac.uk/life-science...
Reposted by Bill Podlaski
We are very excited to announce that our new preprint with Saleh Esteki, @stefanofusi.bsky.social, and @roozbehkiani.bsky.social is now available on biorxiv! www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6.... We investigated how reward context is learned, represented, and updated to bias decisions. Thread 🧵👇! 1/13
www.biorxiv.org
January 16, 2026 at 10:16 PM
We are very excited to announce that our new preprint with Saleh Esteki, @stefanofusi.bsky.social, and @roozbehkiani.bsky.social is now available on biorxiv! www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6.... We investigated how reward context is learned, represented, and updated to bias decisions. Thread 🧵👇! 1/13
Reposted by Bill Podlaski
Please spread the word🔊My lab is looking to hire two international postdocs. If you want to do comp neuro, combine machine learning and awesome math to understand neural circuit activity, then come work with us! Bonn is such a cool place for neuroscience now, you don't want to miss out.
January 10, 2026 at 5:39 PM
Please spread the word🔊My lab is looking to hire two international postdocs. If you want to do comp neuro, combine machine learning and awesome math to understand neural circuit activity, then come work with us! Bonn is such a cool place for neuroscience now, you don't want to miss out.
Reposted by Bill Podlaski
When and why do modular representations emerge in neural networks?
@stefanofusi.bsky.social and I posted a preprint answering this question last year, and now it has been extensively revised, refocused, and generalized. Read more here: doi.org/10.1101/2024... (1/7)
@stefanofusi.bsky.social and I posted a preprint answering this question last year, and now it has been extensively revised, refocused, and generalized. Read more here: doi.org/10.1101/2024... (1/7)
January 9, 2026 at 7:06 PM
When and why do modular representations emerge in neural networks?
@stefanofusi.bsky.social and I posted a preprint answering this question last year, and now it has been extensively revised, refocused, and generalized. Read more here: doi.org/10.1101/2024... (1/7)
@stefanofusi.bsky.social and I posted a preprint answering this question last year, and now it has been extensively revised, refocused, and generalized. Read more here: doi.org/10.1101/2024... (1/7)
Reposted by Bill Podlaski
Move over ReLU 🚀
Meet **ReSU** (Rectified Spectral Unit): a biologically inspired, self-supervised unit for learning from dynamical data. A backprop-free multilayer ReSU network learns predictive features and recapitulates *Drosophila* vision.
To appear at AAAI: arxiv.org/abs/2512.23146
Meet **ReSU** (Rectified Spectral Unit): a biologically inspired, self-supervised unit for learning from dynamical data. A backprop-free multilayer ReSU network learns predictive features and recapitulates *Drosophila* vision.
To appear at AAAI: arxiv.org/abs/2512.23146
A Network of Biologically Inspired Rectified Spectral Units (ReSUs) Learns Hierarchical Features Without Error Backpropagation
We introduce a biologically inspired, multilayer neural architecture composed of Rectified Spectral Units (ReSUs). Each ReSU projects a recent window of its input history onto a canonical direction ob...
arxiv.org
January 1, 2026 at 4:27 PM
Move over ReLU 🚀
Meet **ReSU** (Rectified Spectral Unit): a biologically inspired, self-supervised unit for learning from dynamical data. A backprop-free multilayer ReSU network learns predictive features and recapitulates *Drosophila* vision.
To appear at AAAI: arxiv.org/abs/2512.23146
Meet **ReSU** (Rectified Spectral Unit): a biologically inspired, self-supervised unit for learning from dynamical data. A backprop-free multilayer ReSU network learns predictive features and recapitulates *Drosophila* vision.
To appear at AAAI: arxiv.org/abs/2512.23146
Reposted by Bill Podlaski
Just published my review of neuroscience in 2025, on The Spike.
The 10th of these, would you believe?
This year we have foundation models, breakthroughs in using light to understand the brain, a gene therapy, and more
Enjoy!
medium.com/the-spike/20...
The 10th of these, would you believe?
This year we have foundation models, breakthroughs in using light to understand the brain, a gene therapy, and more
Enjoy!
medium.com/the-spike/20...
2025: A Review of the Year in Neuroscience
Enlightening the brain
medium.com
December 30, 2025 at 3:52 PM
Just published my review of neuroscience in 2025, on The Spike.
The 10th of these, would you believe?
This year we have foundation models, breakthroughs in using light to understand the brain, a gene therapy, and more
Enjoy!
medium.com/the-spike/20...
The 10th of these, would you believe?
This year we have foundation models, breakthroughs in using light to understand the brain, a gene therapy, and more
Enjoy!
medium.com/the-spike/20...
Reposted by Bill Podlaski
New Perspective from myself, Sarah Heilbronner and @myoo.bsky.social . “Rethinking the centrality of brain areas in understanding functional organization” in Nature Neuroscience. 🧵
rdcu.be/eVZ1A
rdcu.be/eVZ1A
Rethinking the centrality of brain areas in understanding functional organization
Nature Neuroscience - Parcellation of the cortex into functionally modular brain areas is foundational to neuroscience. Here, Hayden, Heilbronner and Yoo question the central status of brain areas...
rdcu.be
December 23, 2025 at 1:02 PM
New Perspective from myself, Sarah Heilbronner and @myoo.bsky.social . “Rethinking the centrality of brain areas in understanding functional organization” in Nature Neuroscience. 🧵
rdcu.be/eVZ1A
rdcu.be/eVZ1A
Reposted by Bill Podlaski
Amid the rise of billion-parameter models, I argue that toy models, with just a few neurons, remain essential—and may be all neuroscience needs, writes @marcusghosh.bsky.social.
#neuroskyence
www.thetransmitter.org/theoretical-...
#neuroskyence
www.thetransmitter.org/theoretical-...
Not playing around: Why neuroscience needs toy models
Amid the rise of billion-parameter models, I argue that toy models, with just a few neurons, remain essential—and may be all neuroscience needs.
www.thetransmitter.org
December 22, 2025 at 2:44 PM
Amid the rise of billion-parameter models, I argue that toy models, with just a few neurons, remain essential—and may be all neuroscience needs, writes @marcusghosh.bsky.social.
#neuroskyence
www.thetransmitter.org/theoretical-...
#neuroskyence
www.thetransmitter.org/theoretical-...
Reposted by Bill Podlaski
Our paper on data constrained RNN that generalize to optogenetic perturbations now citable on eLife:
doi.org/10.7554/eLif...
doi.org/10.7554/eLif...
December 18, 2025 at 11:07 PM
Our paper on data constrained RNN that generalize to optogenetic perturbations now citable on eLife:
doi.org/10.7554/eLif...
doi.org/10.7554/eLif...
Reposted by Bill Podlaski
📢Are you a young PI or senior postdoc in neuroscience looking to embark on the challenging journey of starting your own lab?
📆Then save July 5, 2026 in your calendar and join us in Barcelona for the second Young PI Symposium.
youngpisymposium2026.com
📆Then save July 5, 2026 in your calendar and join us in Barcelona for the second Young PI Symposium.
youngpisymposium2026.com
Young PI Symposium 2026
Visit the post for more.
youngpisymposium2026.com
December 13, 2025 at 2:59 PM
📢Are you a young PI or senior postdoc in neuroscience looking to embark on the challenging journey of starting your own lab?
📆Then save July 5, 2026 in your calendar and join us in Barcelona for the second Young PI Symposium.
youngpisymposium2026.com
📆Then save July 5, 2026 in your calendar and join us in Barcelona for the second Young PI Symposium.
youngpisymposium2026.com
Reposted by Bill Podlaski
Dimensionality reduction may be the wrong approach to understanding neural representations. Our new paper shows that across human visual cortex, dimensionality is unbounded and scales with dataset size—we show this across nearly four orders of magnitude. journals.plos.org/ploscompbiol...
December 11, 2025 at 3:32 PM
Dimensionality reduction may be the wrong approach to understanding neural representations. Our new paper shows that across human visual cortex, dimensionality is unbounded and scales with dataset size—we show this across nearly four orders of magnitude. journals.plos.org/ploscompbiol...
Reposted by Bill Podlaski
I’m happy to share some recent work out in PLOS Computational Biology with @guille-martin.bsky.social and Christian Machens at @champalimaudr.bsky.social . We use neural coding and population geometry to study different perspectives on hippocampal remapping.
journals.plos.org/ploscompbiol...
journals.plos.org/ploscompbiol...
Three types of remapping with linear decoders: A population-geometric perspective
Author summary Place cells of the hippocampus form unique activity patterns in different environments, a process called remapping. However, it is not clear what the relationship is between changes in ...
journals.plos.org
December 9, 2025 at 3:09 PM
I’m happy to share some recent work out in PLOS Computational Biology with @guille-martin.bsky.social and Christian Machens at @champalimaudr.bsky.social . We use neural coding and population geometry to study different perspectives on hippocampal remapping.
journals.plos.org/ploscompbiol...
journals.plos.org/ploscompbiol...
I’m happy to share some recent work out in PLOS Computational Biology with @guille-martin.bsky.social and Christian Machens at @champalimaudr.bsky.social . We use neural coding and population geometry to study different perspectives on hippocampal remapping.
journals.plos.org/ploscompbiol...
journals.plos.org/ploscompbiol...
Three types of remapping with linear decoders: A population-geometric perspective
Author summary Place cells of the hippocampus form unique activity patterns in different environments, a process called remapping. However, it is not clear what the relationship is between changes in ...
journals.plos.org
December 9, 2025 at 3:09 PM
I’m happy to share some recent work out in PLOS Computational Biology with @guille-martin.bsky.social and Christian Machens at @champalimaudr.bsky.social . We use neural coding and population geometry to study different perspectives on hippocampal remapping.
journals.plos.org/ploscompbiol...
journals.plos.org/ploscompbiol...
Reposted by Bill Podlaski
Are manifolds real?
Are latent circuits real?
Tatiana @engeltatiana.bsky.social uses one, infers the other, and says yes to both.
Also, how timescales are different and the same across the entire brain...
braininspired.co/podcast/226/
Are latent circuits real?
Tatiana @engeltatiana.bsky.social uses one, infers the other, and says yes to both.
Also, how timescales are different and the same across the entire brain...
braininspired.co/podcast/226/
December 4, 2025 at 6:52 PM
Are manifolds real?
Are latent circuits real?
Tatiana @engeltatiana.bsky.social uses one, infers the other, and says yes to both.
Also, how timescales are different and the same across the entire brain...
braininspired.co/podcast/226/
Are latent circuits real?
Tatiana @engeltatiana.bsky.social uses one, infers the other, and says yes to both.
Also, how timescales are different and the same across the entire brain...
braininspired.co/podcast/226/
Reposted by Bill Podlaski
Finally got the job ad—looking for 2 PhD students to start spring next year:
www.gao-unit.com/join-us/
If comp neuro, ML, and AI4Neuro is your thing, or you just nerd out over brain recordings, apply!
I'm at neurips. DM me here / on the conference app or email if you want to meet 🏖️🌮
www.gao-unit.com/join-us/
If comp neuro, ML, and AI4Neuro is your thing, or you just nerd out over brain recordings, apply!
I'm at neurips. DM me here / on the conference app or email if you want to meet 🏖️🌮
December 3, 2025 at 9:37 AM
Finally got the job ad—looking for 2 PhD students to start spring next year:
www.gao-unit.com/join-us/
If comp neuro, ML, and AI4Neuro is your thing, or you just nerd out over brain recordings, apply!
I'm at neurips. DM me here / on the conference app or email if you want to meet 🏖️🌮
www.gao-unit.com/join-us/
If comp neuro, ML, and AI4Neuro is your thing, or you just nerd out over brain recordings, apply!
I'm at neurips. DM me here / on the conference app or email if you want to meet 🏖️🌮
Reposted by Bill Podlaski
🧠 Applications for the International Neuroscience Doctoral Programme (INDP) @champalimaudf.bsky.social open until 31 January 2026.
☀️ Join our vibrant and international research community in sunny Lisbon!
🔗 fchampalimaud.org/champalimaud...
☀️ Join our vibrant and international research community in sunny Lisbon!
🔗 fchampalimaud.org/champalimaud...
December 3, 2025 at 6:33 PM
🧠 Applications for the International Neuroscience Doctoral Programme (INDP) @champalimaudf.bsky.social open until 31 January 2026.
☀️ Join our vibrant and international research community in sunny Lisbon!
🔗 fchampalimaud.org/champalimaud...
☀️ Join our vibrant and international research community in sunny Lisbon!
🔗 fchampalimaud.org/champalimaud...
Reposted by Bill Podlaski
Call is out for Champalimaud International Neuroscience Doctoral Programme 2026! docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1F...
docs.google.com
December 2, 2025 at 5:50 PM
Call is out for Champalimaud International Neuroscience Doctoral Programme 2026! docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1F...
Reposted by Bill Podlaski
How I contributed to rejecting one of my favorite papers of all times, Yes, I teach it to students daily, and refer to it in lots of papers. Sorry. open.substack.com/pub/kording/...
How I contributed to rejecting one of my favorite papers of all time
I believe we should talk about the mistakes we make.
open.substack.com
December 2, 2025 at 1:27 AM
How I contributed to rejecting one of my favorite papers of all times, Yes, I teach it to students daily, and refer to it in lots of papers. Sorry. open.substack.com/pub/kording/...
Reposted by Bill Podlaski
1/6 New preprint 🚀 How does the cortex learn to represent things and how they move without reconstructing sensory stimuli? We developed a circuit-centric recurrent predictive learning (RPL) model based on JEPAs.
🔗 doi.org/10.1101/2025...
Led by @atenagm.bsky.social @mshalvagal.bsky.social
🔗 doi.org/10.1101/2025...
Led by @atenagm.bsky.social @mshalvagal.bsky.social
November 27, 2025 at 8:24 AM
1/6 New preprint 🚀 How does the cortex learn to represent things and how they move without reconstructing sensory stimuli? We developed a circuit-centric recurrent predictive learning (RPL) model based on JEPAs.
🔗 doi.org/10.1101/2025...
Led by @atenagm.bsky.social @mshalvagal.bsky.social
🔗 doi.org/10.1101/2025...
Led by @atenagm.bsky.social @mshalvagal.bsky.social
Reposted by Bill Podlaski
The hippocampus is not a library, it is a simulation engine.
HPC is known for storing maps of the environment but not so known for generating planned trajectories.
This paper proposes that recurrence in CA3 is crucial for planning.
A🧵with my toy model and notes:
#neuroskyence #compneuro #NeuroAI
HPC is known for storing maps of the environment but not so known for generating planned trajectories.
This paper proposes that recurrence in CA3 is crucial for planning.
A🧵with my toy model and notes:
#neuroskyence #compneuro #NeuroAI
November 28, 2025 at 3:02 AM
The hippocampus is not a library, it is a simulation engine.
HPC is known for storing maps of the environment but not so known for generating planned trajectories.
This paper proposes that recurrence in CA3 is crucial for planning.
A🧵with my toy model and notes:
#neuroskyence #compneuro #NeuroAI
HPC is known for storing maps of the environment but not so known for generating planned trajectories.
This paper proposes that recurrence in CA3 is crucial for planning.
A🧵with my toy model and notes:
#neuroskyence #compneuro #NeuroAI
Reposted by Bill Podlaski
Interested in the neurobiological basis of social behaviour and its dysfunction? Join the Ferreira and @wolfhuette.bsky.social groups at Northumbria University for a fully funded PhD opportunity studying group behaviour in flies. Further details are available here: www.findaphd.com/phds/project...
Neuronal circuit-level action of genes underlying social behaviour dysfunction in Drosophila melanogaster (Ref: RDF26/SE/GNS/FERREIRA) at Northumbria University on FindAPhD.com
PhD Project - Neuronal circuit-level action of genes underlying social behaviour dysfunction in Drosophila melanogaster (Ref: RDF26/SE/GNS/FERREIRA) at Northumbria University, listed on FindAPhD.com
www.findaphd.com
November 22, 2025 at 9:56 AM
Interested in the neurobiological basis of social behaviour and its dysfunction? Join the Ferreira and @wolfhuette.bsky.social groups at Northumbria University for a fully funded PhD opportunity studying group behaviour in flies. Further details are available here: www.findaphd.com/phds/project...
Reposted by Bill Podlaski
Reminder if you missed #SNUFA spiking neural network and neuromorphic workshop earlier this month, all our talks were recorded and are now available to watch. 🤖🧠🧪
www.youtube.com/playlist?lis...
www.youtube.com/playlist?lis...
SNUFA 2025 Workshop - YouTube
Spiking neural networks as universal function approximators (SNUFA) online workshop 2025. For more see http://snufa.net/2025/
www.youtube.com
November 20, 2025 at 2:11 PM
Reminder if you missed #SNUFA spiking neural network and neuromorphic workshop earlier this month, all our talks were recorded and are now available to watch. 🤖🧠🧪
www.youtube.com/playlist?lis...
www.youtube.com/playlist?lis...
Reposted by Bill Podlaski
@braininspired.bsky.social talks with Henk de Regt about what it means for both humans and artificial-intelligence agents to “understand,” and how to assess this understanding.
www.thetransmitter.org/brain-inspir...
#neuroskyence
www.thetransmitter.org/brain-inspir...
#neuroskyence
Does AI understand what it produces? Henk de Regt explores how we might assess understanding in machines and humans
Building on his philosophy of how scientists understand what they work on, de Regt is extending his approach to test understanding in machines.
www.thetransmitter.org
November 19, 2025 at 3:04 PM
@braininspired.bsky.social talks with Henk de Regt about what it means for both humans and artificial-intelligence agents to “understand,” and how to assess this understanding.
www.thetransmitter.org/brain-inspir...
#neuroskyence
www.thetransmitter.org/brain-inspir...
#neuroskyence
Reposted by Bill Podlaski
Psst - neuromorphic folks. Did you know that you can solve the SHD dataset with 90% accuracy using only 22 kb of parameter memory by quantising weights and delays? Check out our preprint with @pengfei-sun.bsky.social and @danakarca.bsky.social, or read the TLDR below. 👇🤖🧠🧪 arxiv.org/abs/2510.27434
Exploiting heterogeneous delays for efficient computation in low-bit neural networks
Neural networks rely on learning synaptic weights. However, this overlooks other neural parameters that can also be learned and may be utilized by the brain. One such parameter is the delay: the brain...
arxiv.org
November 13, 2025 at 5:40 PM
Psst - neuromorphic folks. Did you know that you can solve the SHD dataset with 90% accuracy using only 22 kb of parameter memory by quantising weights and delays? Check out our preprint with @pengfei-sun.bsky.social and @danakarca.bsky.social, or read the TLDR below. 👇🤖🧠🧪 arxiv.org/abs/2510.27434