Jakob Macke
@jakhmack.bsky.social
#AI4Science #CompNeuro #NeuroAI #SBI
www.mackelab.org @mackelab.bsky.social
· Prof Uni Tuebingen ML4Science BCCN tue.ai
· Adjunct MPI IS · Fellow ellis.eu
· currently hiring postdocs and PhD students
· sometimes goes for a run
www.mackelab.org @mackelab.bsky.social
· Prof Uni Tuebingen ML4Science BCCN tue.ai
· Adjunct MPI IS · Fellow ellis.eu
· currently hiring postdocs and PhD students
· sometimes goes for a run
Pinned
Jakob Macke
@jakhmack.bsky.social
· Nov 11
Alright: I develop ML/AI tools for scientific discovery with focus on neuroscience. In practice, currently: Simulation-based inference to discover data-compatible models, deep learning to optimise mechanistic models (flies!) and probabilistic ML to analyse + visualise high-d neural data (humans!)
Reposted by Jakob Macke
A special year for the Cajal Course in Computational Neuroscience: the BRAIN Prize winners Haim Sompolinsky and Larry Abbott will join us as keynote speakers. And we will bring you the same great roster of instructors as every year. Applications are now open! cajal-training.org/on-site/comp...
The Brain Prize Course - Computational and Theoretical Neuroscience - CAJAL
[…]
cajal-training.org
January 31, 2026 at 9:20 PM
A special year for the Cajal Course in Computational Neuroscience: the BRAIN Prize winners Haim Sompolinsky and Larry Abbott will join us as keynote speakers. And we will bring you the same great roster of instructors as every year. Applications are now open! cajal-training.org/on-site/comp...
Reposted by Jakob Macke
SBI Hackathon Grenoble is a wrap! 🎉
35 researchers and a great hybrid format of 1.5 days of tutorials + 1.5 days of applied hackathon. Many went from “having heard of sbi” to applying full SBI workflows to their own research projects.
🧵👇
35 researchers and a great hybrid format of 1.5 days of tutorials + 1.5 days of applied hackathon. Many went from “having heard of sbi” to applying full SBI workflows to their own research projects.
🧵👇
January 23, 2026 at 6:51 PM
SBI Hackathon Grenoble is a wrap! 🎉
35 researchers and a great hybrid format of 1.5 days of tutorials + 1.5 days of applied hackathon. Many went from “having heard of sbi” to applying full SBI workflows to their own research projects.
🧵👇
35 researchers and a great hybrid format of 1.5 days of tutorials + 1.5 days of applied hackathon. Many went from “having heard of sbi” to applying full SBI workflows to their own research projects.
🧵👇
Reposted by Jakob Macke
Happy 2026 everyone! Two freshly minted PhDs 🧑🎓emerged from our lab at the end of last year.
We congratulate Dr Julius Vetter (@vetterj.bsky.social) and Dr Guy Moss (@gmoss13.bsky.social)! Here seen celebrating with the lab 🎳. 1/3
We congratulate Dr Julius Vetter (@vetterj.bsky.social) and Dr Guy Moss (@gmoss13.bsky.social)! Here seen celebrating with the lab 🎳. 1/3
January 13, 2026 at 3:43 PM
Happy 2026 everyone! Two freshly minted PhDs 🧑🎓emerged from our lab at the end of last year.
We congratulate Dr Julius Vetter (@vetterj.bsky.social) and Dr Guy Moss (@gmoss13.bsky.social)! Here seen celebrating with the lab 🎳. 1/3
We congratulate Dr Julius Vetter (@vetterj.bsky.social) and Dr Guy Moss (@gmoss13.bsky.social)! Here seen celebrating with the lab 🎳. 1/3
Reposted by Jakob Macke
📢We’re hiring: W3-Professorship in Machine Learning in Physics @unituebingen.bsky.social! What we’re looking for: Established research profile in a core area of #physics (condensedmatter, quantum or theoretical particle physics), strong track record in research questions related to #ML and/or #AI.
December 15, 2025 at 9:23 AM
📢We’re hiring: W3-Professorship in Machine Learning in Physics @unituebingen.bsky.social! What we’re looking for: Established research profile in a core area of #physics (condensedmatter, quantum or theoretical particle physics), strong track record in research questions related to #ML and/or #AI.
Congrats to all the ERC COG recipients, of course especially to the 5 from @unituebingen.bsky.social, and even more so to the @ml4science.bsky.social members @tobiasuhauser.bsky.social and @andreasgeiger.bsky.social (AI assistants!)!!!
erc.europa.eu/system/files...
erc.europa.eu/system/files...
erc.europa.eu
December 9, 2025 at 12:58 PM
Congrats to all the ERC COG recipients, of course especially to the 5 from @unituebingen.bsky.social, and even more so to the @ml4science.bsky.social members @tobiasuhauser.bsky.social and @andreasgeiger.bsky.social (AI assistants!)!!!
erc.europa.eu/system/files...
erc.europa.eu/system/files...
Come work with us!!!
We are looking for a Research Engineer (E13 TV-L) to work at the intersection of #ML and #compneuro! 🤖🧠
Help us build large-scale bio-inspired neural networks, write high-quality research code, and contribute to open-source tools like jaxley, sbi, and flyvis 🪰.
More info: www.mackelab.org/jobs/
Help us build large-scale bio-inspired neural networks, write high-quality research code, and contribute to open-source tools like jaxley, sbi, and flyvis 🪰.
More info: www.mackelab.org/jobs/
Jobs - mackelab
The MackeLab is a research group at the Excellence Cluster Machine Learning at Tübingen University!
www.mackelab.org
December 4, 2025 at 7:36 AM
Come work with us!!!
Reposted by Jakob Macke
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 🏖️🌮
We were asked to do an online training on 'AI awareness' by admin. I almost failed the test, as I was not aware of some of the fundamental limitations of #AI4Science.
December 2, 2025 at 10:18 AM
We were asked to do an online training on 'AI awareness' by admin. I almost failed the test, as I was not aware of some of the fundamental limitations of #AI4Science.
Not going to NeurIPS Nor Eurips, but the lab is showing cool new work on SBI and differentiable biophysics, do check it out and talk to them (we also have open positions …)!
Our group is at NeurIPS and EurIPS this year with four papers and one workshop poster. If you are either curious about SBI with autoML, with foundation models, or on function spaces or about differentiable simulators with Jaxley, have a look below 👇 1/11
December 1, 2025 at 6:51 PM
Not going to NeurIPS Nor Eurips, but the lab is showing cool new work on SBI and differentiable biophysics, do check it out and talk to them (we also have open positions …)!
@gmoss13.bsky.social et al sending SBI to space 🚀*!!!
I’m super excited to present our new work in #Eurips2025 and #Neurips2025! We developed FNOPE: a new simulation-based inference (SBI) method which excels at inferring function-valued parameters!
Paper: openreview.net/forum?id=yB5...
Code: github.com/mackelab/fnope
(1/9)
Paper: openreview.net/forum?id=yB5...
Code: github.com/mackelab/fnope
(1/9)
FNOPE: Simulation-based inference on function spaces with Fourier...
Simulation-based inference (SBI) is an established approach for performing Bayesian inference on scientific simulators. SBI so far works best on low-dimensional parametric models. However, it is...
openreview.net
December 1, 2025 at 2:26 PM
@gmoss13.bsky.social et al sending SBI to space 🚀*!!!
Reposted by Jakob Macke
On our blog: For decades, brain simulations have either been largely simplified, or they could not perform cognitive tasks. #JAXLEY, a new AI tool, opens possibilities to build brain simulations that overcome both limitations: www.machinelearningforscience.de/en/jaxley-ai... #AIforScience
AI tool for brain simulations links cellular detail to cognitive functions — MACHINE LEARNING for science
For decades, brain simulations have either been largely simplified, or they could not perform cognitive tasks. A new AI tool opens possibilities to build brain simulations that can achieve both.
www.machinelearningforscience.de
November 24, 2025 at 10:04 AM
On our blog: For decades, brain simulations have either been largely simplified, or they could not perform cognitive tasks. #JAXLEY, a new AI tool, opens possibilities to build brain simulations that overcome both limitations: www.machinelearningforscience.de/en/jaxley-ai... #AIforScience
Possibly the best part of the job: The amazing students and scientists we get to work with!
MackeLab has grown! 🎉 Warm welcome to 5(!) brilliant and fun new PhD students / research scientists who joined our lab in the past year — we can’t wait to do great science and already have good times together! 🤖🧠 Meet them in the thread 👇 1/7
November 28, 2025 at 10:32 AM
Possibly the best part of the job: The amazing students and scientists we get to work with!
Simulation-based inference has really become a commonly used tool for parameter inference across many fields and applications. We (finally...) got together to write a tutorial introduction and guide to (hopefully) help users get started and navigate the different methods and diagnostics!
Simulation-based inference (SBI) has transformed parameter inference across a wide range of domains. To help practitioners get started and make the most of these methods, we joined forces with researchers from many institutions and wrote a practical guide to SBI.
📄 Paper: arxiv.org/abs/2508.12939
📄 Paper: arxiv.org/abs/2508.12939
Simulation-Based Inference: A Practical Guide
A central challenge in many areas of science and engineering is to identify model parameters that are consistent with prior knowledge and empirical data. Bayesian inference offers a principled framewo...
arxiv.org
November 21, 2025 at 3:34 PM
Simulation-based inference has really become a commonly used tool for parameter inference across many fields and applications. We (finally...) got together to write a tutorial introduction and guide to (hopefully) help users get started and navigate the different methods and diagnostics!
Reposted by Jakob Macke
I am super happy to share that our project on training biophysical models with Jaxley is now published in Nature Methods: www.nature.com/articles/s41...
Jaxley: differentiable simulation enables large-scale training of detailed biophysical models of neural dynamics - Nature Methods
Jaxley is a versatile platform for biophysical modeling in neuroscience. It allows efficiently simulating large-scale biophysical models on CPUs, GPUs and TPUs. Model parameters can be optimized with ...
www.nature.com
November 13, 2025 at 12:38 PM
I am super happy to share that our project on training biophysical models with Jaxley is now published in Nature Methods: www.nature.com/articles/s41...
Reposted by Jakob Macke
Great new work from the labs of @jakhmack.bsky.social and @philipp.hertie.ai! The software Jaxley enables brain simulations which both imitate the processes in the brain in detail and can solve challenging cognitive tasks. Press release of @unituebingen.bsky.social: uni-tuebingen.de/en/universit...
November 13, 2025 at 4:56 PM
Great new work from the labs of @jakhmack.bsky.social and @philipp.hertie.ai! The software Jaxley enables brain simulations which both imitate the processes in the brain in detail and can solve challenging cognitive tasks. Press release of @unituebingen.bsky.social: uni-tuebingen.de/en/universit...
Congrats to @deismic.bsky.social and everyone for getting this out!
Our work on training biophysical models with Jaxley is now out in @natmethods.nature.com. Led by @deismic.bsky.social, with @philipp.hertie.ai, @ppjgoncalves.bsky.social & @jakhmack.bsky.social et al.
Paper: www.nature.com/articles/s41...
Paper: www.nature.com/articles/s41...
Jaxley: differentiable simulation enables large-scale training of detailed biophysical models of neural dynamics - Nature Methods
Jaxley is a versatile platform for biophysical modeling in neuroscience. It allows efficiently simulating large-scale biophysical models on CPUs, GPUs and TPUs. Model parameters can be optimized with ...
www.nature.com
November 13, 2025 at 1:28 PM
Congrats to @deismic.bsky.social and everyone for getting this out!
Reposted by Jakob Macke
“Mapping ion channel function” doi.org/10.7554/eLif... isn’t exactly a citation slayer, but it’s still one of my favourites (& my first independent project). Today we push pt 2, where we trace code origin & unite almost all channel models in a common expression. Boom! www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...
An ion channel omnimodel for standardized biophysical neuron modelling
Biophysical neuron modeling is an indispensable tool in neuroscience research, with the combination of diverse ion channel kinetics and morphologies being used to explain various single-neuron propert...
www.biorxiv.org
October 6, 2025 at 6:25 PM
“Mapping ion channel function” doi.org/10.7554/eLif... isn’t exactly a citation slayer, but it’s still one of my favourites (& my first independent project). Today we push pt 2, where we trace code origin & unite almost all channel models in a common expression. Boom! www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...
Reposted by Jakob Macke
🎉 sbi participated in GSoC 2025 through @numfocus.bsky.social and it was a great success: our two students contributed major new features and substantial internal improvements: 🧵 👇
October 17, 2025 at 1:30 PM
🎉 sbi participated in GSoC 2025 through @numfocus.bsky.social and it was a great success: our two students contributed major new features and substantial internal improvements: 🧵 👇
Reposted by Jakob Macke
Hello Frankfurt 🇩🇪 - We are excited to share the latest result from our group and collaborators at
@bernsteinneuro.bsky.social 🚀🧠 #BernsteinConference
Thanks to @brainloops.bsky.social, @ekfstiftung.bsky.social and @cherish-msca.bsky.social for supporting these projects and our scholars.
@bernsteinneuro.bsky.social 🚀🧠 #BernsteinConference
Thanks to @brainloops.bsky.social, @ekfstiftung.bsky.social and @cherish-msca.bsky.social for supporting these projects and our scholars.
September 30, 2025 at 2:19 PM
Hello Frankfurt 🇩🇪 - We are excited to share the latest result from our group and collaborators at
@bernsteinneuro.bsky.social 🚀🧠 #BernsteinConference
Thanks to @brainloops.bsky.social, @ekfstiftung.bsky.social and @cherish-msca.bsky.social for supporting these projects and our scholars.
@bernsteinneuro.bsky.social 🚀🧠 #BernsteinConference
Thanks to @brainloops.bsky.social, @ekfstiftung.bsky.social and @cherish-msca.bsky.social for supporting these projects and our scholars.
Reposted by Jakob Macke
The Macke lab is well-represented at the @bernsteinneuro.bsky.social conference in Frankfurt this year! We have lots of exciting new work to present with 7 posters (details👇) 1/9
September 30, 2025 at 2:06 PM
The Macke lab is well-represented at the @bernsteinneuro.bsky.social conference in Frankfurt this year! We have lots of exciting new work to present with 7 posters (details👇) 1/9
Reposted by Jakob Macke
From hackathon to release: sbi v0.25 is here! 🎉
What happens when dozens of SBI researchers and practitioners collaborate for a week? New inference methods, new documentation, lots of new embedding networks, a bridge to pyro and a bridge between flow matching and score-based methods 🤯
1/7 🧵
What happens when dozens of SBI researchers and practitioners collaborate for a week? New inference methods, new documentation, lots of new embedding networks, a bridge to pyro and a bridge between flow matching and score-based methods 🤯
1/7 🧵
September 9, 2025 at 3:00 PM
From hackathon to release: sbi v0.25 is here! 🎉
What happens when dozens of SBI researchers and practitioners collaborate for a week? New inference methods, new documentation, lots of new embedding networks, a bridge to pyro and a bridge between flow matching and score-based methods 🤯
1/7 🧵
What happens when dozens of SBI researchers and practitioners collaborate for a week? New inference methods, new documentation, lots of new embedding networks, a bridge to pyro and a bridge between flow matching and score-based methods 🤯
1/7 🧵
Reposted by Jakob Macke
Sharing this here a bit late, but @vstaros.bsky.social and I wrote a little something about our experience contributing to the @sbi-devs.bsky.social (simulation-based inference) hackathon. @mlcolab.org @mackelab.bsky.social
We were obviously very hungry while writing.
We were obviously very hungry while writing.
A retrospective on the 2025 SBI Hackathon
You walk into a bakery, take one bite of a still-warm pastry, and think: “Whoa - there’s rye flour, a hint of orange zest, maybe cardamom… and is that buckwheat honey?” From that single taste you begi...
mlcolab.org
July 31, 2025 at 11:54 AM
Sharing this here a bit late, but @vstaros.bsky.social and I wrote a little something about our experience contributing to the @sbi-devs.bsky.social (simulation-based inference) hackathon. @mlcolab.org @mackelab.bsky.social
We were obviously very hungry while writing.
We were obviously very hungry while writing.
Reposted by Jakob Macke
My first paper on simulation-based inference (SBI) as part of @mackelab.bsky.social!
Exciting work on adapting state-of-the-art foundation models for posterior estimation. Almost plug-and-play, and surprisingly effective.
Paper/code in thread below 🧵
Exciting work on adapting state-of-the-art foundation models for posterior estimation. Almost plug-and-play, and surprisingly effective.
Paper/code in thread below 🧵
New preprint: SBI with foundation models!
Tired of training or tuning your inference network, or waiting for your simulations to finish? Our method NPE-PF can help: It provides training-free simulation-based inference, achieving competitive performance with orders of magnitude fewer simulations! ⚡️
Tired of training or tuning your inference network, or waiting for your simulations to finish? Our method NPE-PF can help: It provides training-free simulation-based inference, achieving competitive performance with orders of magnitude fewer simulations! ⚡️
July 23, 2025 at 6:45 PM
My first paper on simulation-based inference (SBI) as part of @mackelab.bsky.social!
Exciting work on adapting state-of-the-art foundation models for posterior estimation. Almost plug-and-play, and surprisingly effective.
Paper/code in thread below 🧵
Exciting work on adapting state-of-the-art foundation models for posterior estimation. Almost plug-and-play, and surprisingly effective.
Paper/code in thread below 🧵
I have been genuinely amazed how well tabpfn works as a density estimator, and how helpful this is for SBI ... Great work by @vetterj.bsky.social, Manuel and @danielged.bsky.social!!
New preprint: SBI with foundation models!
Tired of training or tuning your inference network, or waiting for your simulations to finish? Our method NPE-PF can help: It provides training-free simulation-based inference, achieving competitive performance with orders of magnitude fewer simulations! ⚡️
Tired of training or tuning your inference network, or waiting for your simulations to finish? Our method NPE-PF can help: It provides training-free simulation-based inference, achieving competitive performance with orders of magnitude fewer simulations! ⚡️
July 23, 2025 at 2:37 PM
I have been genuinely amazed how well tabpfn works as a density estimator, and how helpful this is for SBI ... Great work by @vetterj.bsky.social, Manuel and @danielged.bsky.social!!
Reposted by Jakob Macke
Together with #AIMS, the African Institute for Mathematical Sciences, we have an exciting position to fill: The AIMS - Tübingen Junior Research Chair in Machine Learning for Science! 1/2
July 16, 2025 at 12:47 PM
Together with #AIMS, the African Institute for Mathematical Sciences, we have an exciting position to fill: The AIMS - Tübingen Junior Research Chair in Machine Learning for Science! 1/2