Adam Steel
@neurosteel.bsky.social
Neuroscience. Memory, perception, action.
Assistant professor at University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign
@dartmouth + @Vassar + @UniofOxford alum. Views are mine. RTs, Likes, and flws ≠ endorsement
Assistant professor at University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign
@dartmouth + @Vassar + @UniofOxford alum. Views are mine. RTs, Likes, and flws ≠ endorsement
Reposted by Adam Steel
Columbia Psych is hiring *two* junior faculty in Cognitive Science/Neuroscience this year! If you work on cognition (broadly defined), submit your application materials as soon as possible (review starts Nov 1). If you have questions you can reach out to me by email! apply.interfolio.com/175428
Apply - Interfolio
{{$ctrl.$state.data.pageTitle}} - Apply - Interfolio
apply.interfolio.com
October 23, 2025 at 6:28 PM
Columbia Psych is hiring *two* junior faculty in Cognitive Science/Neuroscience this year! If you work on cognition (broadly defined), submit your application materials as soon as possible (review starts Nov 1). If you have questions you can reach out to me by email! apply.interfolio.com/175428
Reposted by Adam Steel
ok this breakdown of AI writing indicators is incredible. Huge shout-out to the Wikipedia community for this
Wikipedia:Signs of AI writing - Wikipedia
en.wikipedia.org
September 28, 2025 at 2:41 PM
ok this breakdown of AI writing indicators is incredible. Huge shout-out to the Wikipedia community for this
Reposted by Adam Steel
New work led by @mattmattoni.bsky.social
“Overall, results suggest that BOLD activation to reward tasks, and likely other fMRI tasks, is more appropriate for within-person study than between-person study, highlighting a need for intensive longitudinal neuroimaging designs.”
“Overall, results suggest that BOLD activation to reward tasks, and likely other fMRI tasks, is more appropriate for within-person study than between-person study, highlighting a need for intensive longitudinal neuroimaging designs.”
Precision Imaging for Intraindividual Investigation of the Reward Response https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2025.09.26.678878v1
September 30, 2025 at 12:11 AM
New work led by @mattmattoni.bsky.social
“Overall, results suggest that BOLD activation to reward tasks, and likely other fMRI tasks, is more appropriate for within-person study than between-person study, highlighting a need for intensive longitudinal neuroimaging designs.”
“Overall, results suggest that BOLD activation to reward tasks, and likely other fMRI tasks, is more appropriate for within-person study than between-person study, highlighting a need for intensive longitudinal neuroimaging designs.”
Reposted by Adam Steel
Reposted by Adam Steel
Now out in @natneuro.nature.com
What happens to the brain’s body map when a body-part is removed?
Scanning patients before and up to 5 yrs after arm amputation, we discovered the brain’s body map is strikingly preserved despite amputation
www.nature.com/articles/s41593-025-02037-7
🧵1/18
What happens to the brain’s body map when a body-part is removed?
Scanning patients before and up to 5 yrs after arm amputation, we discovered the brain’s body map is strikingly preserved despite amputation
www.nature.com/articles/s41593-025-02037-7
🧵1/18
August 21, 2025 at 9:20 AM
Now out in @natneuro.nature.com
What happens to the brain’s body map when a body-part is removed?
Scanning patients before and up to 5 yrs after arm amputation, we discovered the brain’s body map is strikingly preserved despite amputation
www.nature.com/articles/s41593-025-02037-7
🧵1/18
What happens to the brain’s body map when a body-part is removed?
Scanning patients before and up to 5 yrs after arm amputation, we discovered the brain’s body map is strikingly preserved despite amputation
www.nature.com/articles/s41593-025-02037-7
🧵1/18
Reposted by Adam Steel
Excited to be in Amsterdam for #CCN2025! Come learn about a project combining many of my favorite interests - naturalistic neuroimaging, development, & manifold learning (of course). Catch me at poster C181 on Fri - “Intrinsic dimensionality of brain activity manifolds across tasks and development”
August 12, 2025 at 9:05 AM
Excited to be in Amsterdam for #CCN2025! Come learn about a project combining many of my favorite interests - naturalistic neuroimaging, development, & manifold learning (of course). Catch me at poster C181 on Fri - “Intrinsic dimensionality of brain activity manifolds across tasks and development”
Reposted by Adam Steel
The lateral prefrontal cortex 🧠— which we think of as critical for goal driven behavior + is a target for psychiatric treatments— is fundamentally different in individuals relative to the group averages we’ve often studied.
👇see preprint and thread, led by Zach Ladwig
#neuroskyence #PsychSciSky
👇see preprint and thread, led by Zach Ladwig
#neuroskyence #PsychSciSky
August 14, 2025 at 3:16 PM
The lateral prefrontal cortex 🧠— which we think of as critical for goal driven behavior + is a target for psychiatric treatments— is fundamentally different in individuals relative to the group averages we’ve often studied.
👇see preprint and thread, led by Zach Ladwig
#neuroskyence #PsychSciSky
👇see preprint and thread, led by Zach Ladwig
#neuroskyence #PsychSciSky
Reposted by Adam Steel
🚨 New Preprint 🚨
Targeting intracranial electrical stimulation (ES) to network regions defined within individuals causes network-level effects
By Cyr et al.
***
Q: Can we use individualized network maps from precision fMRI to modulate a targeted network via intracranial ES?
A: Yes!
🧵:
Targeting intracranial electrical stimulation (ES) to network regions defined within individuals causes network-level effects
By Cyr et al.
***
Q: Can we use individualized network maps from precision fMRI to modulate a targeted network via intracranial ES?
A: Yes!
🧵:
August 5, 2025 at 3:31 PM
🚨 New Preprint 🚨
Targeting intracranial electrical stimulation (ES) to network regions defined within individuals causes network-level effects
By Cyr et al.
***
Q: Can we use individualized network maps from precision fMRI to modulate a targeted network via intracranial ES?
A: Yes!
🧵:
Targeting intracranial electrical stimulation (ES) to network regions defined within individuals causes network-level effects
By Cyr et al.
***
Q: Can we use individualized network maps from precision fMRI to modulate a targeted network via intracranial ES?
A: Yes!
🧵:
Reposted by Adam Steel
I’m excited to share my final co-first author paper from my postdoc in Dan Dombeck's lab!
We explored how behavior, senses, and neurons influence how much information in the brain changes over time.
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
#science #research #neuroscience #hippocampus #placecells
We explored how behavior, senses, and neurons influence how much information in the brain changes over time.
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
#science #research #neuroscience #hippocampus #placecells
Hippocampal representations drift in stable multisensory environments - Nature
Tracking of individual place cells in mouse CA1 shows that representational drift is not influenced by changes in environment or behaviour, and is lower for more excitable place cells.
www.nature.com
July 23, 2025 at 4:12 PM
I’m excited to share my final co-first author paper from my postdoc in Dan Dombeck's lab!
We explored how behavior, senses, and neurons influence how much information in the brain changes over time.
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
#science #research #neuroscience #hippocampus #placecells
We explored how behavior, senses, and neurons influence how much information in the brain changes over time.
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
#science #research #neuroscience #hippocampus #placecells
Reposted by Adam Steel
New profile! Dr. Sarah Heilbronner (@srheilbronner.bsky.social) uses cutting-edge neuroanatomical and neuroimaging techniques to decipher the wiring diagram of the primate brain. Follow the link below to learn more!
www.storiesofwin.org/profiles/202...
#StoriesOfWiN #WomenInNeuroscience
www.storiesofwin.org/profiles/202...
#StoriesOfWiN #WomenInNeuroscience
Dr. Sarah Heilbronner — Stories of WiN
uses cutting-edge neuroanatomical and neuroimaging techniques to decipher the wiring diagram of the primate brain
www.storiesofwin.org
July 9, 2025 at 5:06 PM
New profile! Dr. Sarah Heilbronner (@srheilbronner.bsky.social) uses cutting-edge neuroanatomical and neuroimaging techniques to decipher the wiring diagram of the primate brain. Follow the link below to learn more!
www.storiesofwin.org/profiles/202...
#StoriesOfWiN #WomenInNeuroscience
www.storiesofwin.org/profiles/202...
#StoriesOfWiN #WomenInNeuroscience
Reposted by Adam Steel
In these tumultuous times, still happy to report a scientific achievement: our preprint on affordance perception was just published in PNAS!
www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...
Using behavior, fMRI and deep network analyses, we report two key findings. To recapitulate (preprint 🧵lost on other place):
www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...
Using behavior, fMRI and deep network analyses, we report two key findings. To recapitulate (preprint 🧵lost on other place):
Representation of locomotive action affordances in human behavior, brains, and deep neural networks | PNAS
To decide how to move around the world, we must determine which locomotive actions
(e.g., walking, swimming, or climbing) are afforded by the immed...
www.pnas.org
June 16, 2025 at 11:34 AM
In these tumultuous times, still happy to report a scientific achievement: our preprint on affordance perception was just published in PNAS!
www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...
Using behavior, fMRI and deep network analyses, we report two key findings. To recapitulate (preprint 🧵lost on other place):
www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...
Using behavior, fMRI and deep network analyses, we report two key findings. To recapitulate (preprint 🧵lost on other place):
Reposted by Adam Steel
🚨Paper alert!🚨
TL;DR first: We used a pre-trained deep neural network to model fMRI data and to generate images predicted to elicit a large response for each many different parts of the brain. We aggregate these into an awesome interactive brain viewer: piecesofmind.psyc.unr.edu/activation_m...
TL;DR first: We used a pre-trained deep neural network to model fMRI data and to generate images predicted to elicit a large response for each many different parts of the brain. We aggregate these into an awesome interactive brain viewer: piecesofmind.psyc.unr.edu/activation_m...
Cortex Feature Visualization
piecesofmind.psyc.unr.edu
June 12, 2025 at 4:34 PM
🚨Paper alert!🚨
TL;DR first: We used a pre-trained deep neural network to model fMRI data and to generate images predicted to elicit a large response for each many different parts of the brain. We aggregate these into an awesome interactive brain viewer: piecesofmind.psyc.unr.edu/activation_m...
TL;DR first: We used a pre-trained deep neural network to model fMRI data and to generate images predicted to elicit a large response for each many different parts of the brain. We aggregate these into an awesome interactive brain viewer: piecesofmind.psyc.unr.edu/activation_m...
Reposted by Adam Steel
🎺 #BrainMeeting 🧠 Alert!
This Friday, June 13th, the brain meeting speaker will be Adam Steel with a talk entitled “Mechanisms underlying perceptual and mnemonic interaction in the brain”
This will be an online only meeting. All are welcome. Details here: www.fil.ion.ucl.ac.uk/event/mechan...
This Friday, June 13th, the brain meeting speaker will be Adam Steel with a talk entitled “Mechanisms underlying perceptual and mnemonic interaction in the brain”
This will be an online only meeting. All are welcome. Details here: www.fil.ion.ucl.ac.uk/event/mechan...
June 9, 2025 at 11:51 AM
🎺 #BrainMeeting 🧠 Alert!
This Friday, June 13th, the brain meeting speaker will be Adam Steel with a talk entitled “Mechanisms underlying perceptual and mnemonic interaction in the brain”
This will be an online only meeting. All are welcome. Details here: www.fil.ion.ucl.ac.uk/event/mechan...
This Friday, June 13th, the brain meeting speaker will be Adam Steel with a talk entitled “Mechanisms underlying perceptual and mnemonic interaction in the brain”
This will be an online only meeting. All are welcome. Details here: www.fil.ion.ucl.ac.uk/event/mechan...
Reposted by Adam Steel
When you successfully anticipate future events, what happens to your ability to encode the present? 🤔
Successful prediction increases the likelihood of successful encoding. We speculate about how switching between distinct encoding & prediction states can produce this effect.
osf.io/preprints/ps...
Successful prediction increases the likelihood of successful encoding. We speculate about how switching between distinct encoding & prediction states can produce this effect.
osf.io/preprints/ps...
OSF
osf.io
May 13, 2025 at 8:44 PM
When you successfully anticipate future events, what happens to your ability to encode the present? 🤔
Successful prediction increases the likelihood of successful encoding. We speculate about how switching between distinct encoding & prediction states can produce this effect.
osf.io/preprints/ps...
Successful prediction increases the likelihood of successful encoding. We speculate about how switching between distinct encoding & prediction states can produce this effect.
osf.io/preprints/ps...
Reposted by Adam Steel
Despite everything going on, I may have funds to hire a postdoc this year 😬🤞🧑🔬 Open to a wide variety of possible projects in social and cognitive neuroscience. Get in touch if you are interested! Reposts appreciated.
May 9, 2025 at 7:01 PM
Despite everything going on, I may have funds to hire a postdoc this year 😬🤞🧑🔬 Open to a wide variety of possible projects in social and cognitive neuroscience. Get in touch if you are interested! Reposts appreciated.
Reposted by Adam Steel
🚨 Practical URGENT tip for NSF grantees:
Out of an abundance of caution, I would right now go into Research.gov and…
1. Download your NSF award letters.
2. Print PDF your annual reports.
3. Screenshot the status table for annual reports.
NSF is planning maintenance tomorrow to Research.gov
Out of an abundance of caution, I would right now go into Research.gov and…
1. Download your NSF award letters.
2. Print PDF your annual reports.
3. Screenshot the status table for annual reports.
NSF is planning maintenance tomorrow to Research.gov
April 24, 2025 at 9:32 PM
🚨 Practical URGENT tip for NSF grantees:
Out of an abundance of caution, I would right now go into Research.gov and…
1. Download your NSF award letters.
2. Print PDF your annual reports.
3. Screenshot the status table for annual reports.
NSF is planning maintenance tomorrow to Research.gov
Out of an abundance of caution, I would right now go into Research.gov and…
1. Download your NSF award letters.
2. Print PDF your annual reports.
3. Screenshot the status table for annual reports.
NSF is planning maintenance tomorrow to Research.gov
I'm very excited to speak at UBC next Thursday!
Join us for our colloquium with Dr. Adam Steel, Assistant Professor in Cognitive Neuroscience at University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, who will share insights on 'Mechanisms underlying perceptual and mnemonic interaction in the brain'. April 17 | 12:30 - 2:00 pm | Kenny Rm 4001 bit.ly/429cbRB
Colloquium with Dr. Adam Steel on mechanisms underlying perceptual and mnemonic interaction in the brain - UBC Department of Psychology
Join Dr. Adam Steel for a talk on 'mechanisms underlying perceptual and mnemonic interaction in the brain'.
bit.ly
April 10, 2025 at 8:44 PM
I'm very excited to speak at UBC next Thursday!
Reposted by Adam Steel
Likely hiring one postbac trainee for @fmri-today.bsky.social's Section on Functional Imaging Methods. Give the relatively later start time for the search, I'm not yet sure how quickly this search will happen. If you are interested, apply and reach out ASAP. fim.nimh.nih.gov
April 8, 2025 at 8:12 PM
Likely hiring one postbac trainee for @fmri-today.bsky.social's Section on Functional Imaging Methods. Give the relatively later start time for the search, I'm not yet sure how quickly this search will happen. If you are interested, apply and reach out ASAP. fim.nimh.nih.gov
Reposted by Adam Steel
OK here it is, the moment you have all been waiting for! Our advert for 5 posts here at Glasgow: Cognitive neuroscience/psychology. Closing date May 12 - please spread the word
www.nature.com/naturecareer...
www.nature.com/naturecareer...
March 28, 2025 at 7:06 AM
OK here it is, the moment you have all been waiting for! Our advert for 5 posts here at Glasgow: Cognitive neuroscience/psychology. Closing date May 12 - please spread the word
www.nature.com/naturecareer...
www.nature.com/naturecareer...
Reposted by Adam Steel
I have been doing entirely too much earnest posting about deep things recently, I need to do a proper thread about hippo testicles or something just to keep myself sane.
Oh by the way hippos have migratory testicles.
Oh by the way hippos have migratory testicles.
a statue of a hippopotamus with its mouth open and teeth showing .
Alt: A hippo being tossed a watermelon, which it crushes in its massive jaws.
media.tenor.com
March 12, 2025 at 5:33 AM
I have been doing entirely too much earnest posting about deep things recently, I need to do a proper thread about hippo testicles or something just to keep myself sane.
Oh by the way hippos have migratory testicles.
Oh by the way hippos have migratory testicles.
Reposted by Adam Steel
Reflective piece by Eve Marder – "What happened to the pursuit of truth"
rupress.org/jgp/article/...
rupress.org/jgp/article/...
What happened to the pursuit of truth? | Journal of General Physiology | Rockefeller University Press
The knowledge in our brains, not in our phones, is necessary for creative thinking and the pursuit of truth.
rupress.org
January 20, 2025 at 2:13 AM
Reflective piece by Eve Marder – "What happened to the pursuit of truth"
rupress.org/jgp/article/...
rupress.org/jgp/article/...
Reposted by Adam Steel
New paper out in @pnas.org with @laurendinicola.bsky.social, Noam Saadon-Grosman, Mark Eldaief and Randy Buckner!
We revisited the functional specialization of the human hippocampal long axis across two independent datasets, with some surprising results.
www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...
We revisited the functional specialization of the human hippocampal long axis across two independent datasets, with some surprising results.
www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...
PNAS
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS), a peer reviewed journal of the National Academy of Sciences (NAS) - an authoritative source of high-impact, original research that broadly spans...
www.pnas.org
January 14, 2025 at 7:35 PM
New paper out in @pnas.org with @laurendinicola.bsky.social, Noam Saadon-Grosman, Mark Eldaief and Randy Buckner!
We revisited the functional specialization of the human hippocampal long axis across two independent datasets, with some surprising results.
www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...
We revisited the functional specialization of the human hippocampal long axis across two independent datasets, with some surprising results.
www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...
Have you wondered where scene perception and memory intersect in the brain?
Do you want to localize these areas?
In a preprint, @carolinerobertson.bsky.social, Deepa Prasad, Brenda Garcia, and I detail this topography and release these parcels and our localizer.
www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...
Do you want to localize these areas?
In a preprint, @carolinerobertson.bsky.social, Deepa Prasad, Brenda Garcia, and I detail this topography and release these parcels and our localizer.
www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...
January 7, 2025 at 3:15 PM
Have you wondered where scene perception and memory intersect in the brain?
Do you want to localize these areas?
In a preprint, @carolinerobertson.bsky.social, Deepa Prasad, Brenda Garcia, and I detail this topography and release these parcels and our localizer.
www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...
Do you want to localize these areas?
In a preprint, @carolinerobertson.bsky.social, Deepa Prasad, Brenda Garcia, and I detail this topography and release these parcels and our localizer.
www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...
Reposted by Adam Steel
(recycled from X)
My favorite take on LLM intelligence is by Paul Cisek on the connectionists mailing list:
"We are like a bunch of professional magicians (...) wondering: 'Maybe there really is magic?
I think it’s not that machines have passed the Turing Test, but rather that we failed it." 🔥
My favorite take on LLM intelligence is by Paul Cisek on the connectionists mailing list:
"We are like a bunch of professional magicians (...) wondering: 'Maybe there really is magic?
I think it’s not that machines have passed the Turing Test, but rather that we failed it." 🔥
December 10, 2024 at 7:22 PM
(recycled from X)
My favorite take on LLM intelligence is by Paul Cisek on the connectionists mailing list:
"We are like a bunch of professional magicians (...) wondering: 'Maybe there really is magic?
I think it’s not that machines have passed the Turing Test, but rather that we failed it." 🔥
My favorite take on LLM intelligence is by Paul Cisek on the connectionists mailing list:
"We are like a bunch of professional magicians (...) wondering: 'Maybe there really is magic?
I think it’s not that machines have passed the Turing Test, but rather that we failed it." 🔥
Reposted by Adam Steel
We strongly suggest that academic publishers and other platforms that host research rapidly implement a Share to Bluesky button for their articles. Here's how:
docs.bsky.app/docs/advance...
#AcademicSky #HigherEd #Altmetrics
docs.bsky.app/docs/advance...
#AcademicSky #HigherEd #Altmetrics
Action Intent Links | Bluesky
Authors, websites, and apps can use action intent links to implement "Share on Bluesky" buttons, or similar in-app actions. Logged-in users will be directed to the corresponding action view in the Blu...
docs.bsky.app
November 18, 2024 at 2:48 PM
We strongly suggest that academic publishers and other platforms that host research rapidly implement a Share to Bluesky button for their articles. Here's how:
docs.bsky.app/docs/advance...
#AcademicSky #HigherEd #Altmetrics
docs.bsky.app/docs/advance...
#AcademicSky #HigherEd #Altmetrics