Tim Sainburg
@timsainburg.bsky.social
Neuro, Cogsci, ML, and Ethology postdoc / Schmidt Science Fellow at Harvard.
Reposted by Tim Sainburg
🧠🌟🐭 Excited to share some of my postdoc work on the evolution of dexterity!
We compared deer mice evolved in forest vs prairie habitats. We found that forest mice have:
(1) more corticospinal neurons (CSNs)
(2) better hand dexterity
(3) more dexterous climbing, which is linked to CSN number🧵
We compared deer mice evolved in forest vs prairie habitats. We found that forest mice have:
(1) more corticospinal neurons (CSNs)
(2) better hand dexterity
(3) more dexterous climbing, which is linked to CSN number🧵
October 22, 2025 at 8:41 PM
🧠🌟🐭 Excited to share some of my postdoc work on the evolution of dexterity!
We compared deer mice evolved in forest vs prairie habitats. We found that forest mice have:
(1) more corticospinal neurons (CSNs)
(2) better hand dexterity
(3) more dexterous climbing, which is linked to CSN number🧵
We compared deer mice evolved in forest vs prairie habitats. We found that forest mice have:
(1) more corticospinal neurons (CSNs)
(2) better hand dexterity
(3) more dexterous climbing, which is linked to CSN number🧵
Reposted by Tim Sainburg
Reposting this open postdoc position with more detailed specifications. Couldn't find the right fit in the first round—not due to lack of strong candidates, but because we're looking for someone whose expertise matches a specific project. More details in the job ad. Apply!
tinyurl.com/2uskxyrp
tinyurl.com/2uskxyrp
Postdoctoral Research Associate - Biology
Position Summary A postdoctoral position is available in the laboratory of Dr. Andreas Kautt in the Department of Biology on the Danforth Campus at WashU in St. Louis. The Kautt Lab studies the mechan...
tinyurl.com
October 3, 2025 at 10:05 PM
Reposting this open postdoc position with more detailed specifications. Couldn't find the right fit in the first round—not due to lack of strong candidates, but because we're looking for someone whose expertise matches a specific project. More details in the job ad. Apply!
tinyurl.com/2uskxyrp
tinyurl.com/2uskxyrp
Reposted by Tim Sainburg
Thank you to everyone at #ibac2025 for this amazing conference. I met so many great people and learned a lot about so many interesting projects. Excited to see you all again some time! And proud that my poster got the student poster price ☺️ stay tuned for the publication!
September 14, 2025 at 5:24 AM
Thank you to everyone at #ibac2025 for this amazing conference. I met so many great people and learned a lot about so many interesting projects. Excited to see you all again some time! And proud that my poster got the student poster price ☺️ stay tuned for the publication!
Reposted by Tim Sainburg
Reposted by Tim Sainburg
The psych job market may not be dead... but it is gravely injured 😬 So far it's looking like the Trump administration's attacks on higher ed/research are going to have more than 2x the impact on the job market as the covid-19 pandemic. #psychjobs #neurojobs #academicjobs
September 3, 2025 at 6:27 PM
The psych job market may not be dead... but it is gravely injured 😬 So far it's looking like the Trump administration's attacks on higher ed/research are going to have more than 2x the impact on the job market as the covid-19 pandemic. #psychjobs #neurojobs #academicjobs
New paper out today with Asaf Zorea : "Domain-general noise reduction for time-series signals with Noisereduce" (open access)!
We present Noisereduce, a lightweight Python library for denoising signals.
Read the paper: doi.org/10.1038/s415...
Code (library): github.com/timsainb/noi...
We present Noisereduce, a lightweight Python library for denoising signals.
Read the paper: doi.org/10.1038/s415...
Code (library): github.com/timsainb/noi...
Domain general noise reduction for time series signals with Noisereduce - Scientific Reports
Scientific Reports - Domain general noise reduction for time series signals with Noisereduce
doi.org
September 2, 2025 at 6:54 PM
New paper out today with Asaf Zorea : "Domain-general noise reduction for time-series signals with Noisereduce" (open access)!
We present Noisereduce, a lightweight Python library for denoising signals.
Read the paper: doi.org/10.1038/s415...
Code (library): github.com/timsainb/noi...
We present Noisereduce, a lightweight Python library for denoising signals.
Read the paper: doi.org/10.1038/s415...
Code (library): github.com/timsainb/noi...
Reposted by Tim Sainburg
🚨Very happy that my PhD work is now out in @nature.com!
We discovered that evolution, by acting in the midbrain, shifted the threshold to escape in Peromyscus mice, to fine-tune defensive strategies in different environments
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
This was a truly collaborative effort! 🧵⬇️
We discovered that evolution, by acting in the midbrain, shifted the threshold to escape in Peromyscus mice, to fine-tune defensive strategies in different environments
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
This was a truly collaborative effort! 🧵⬇️
July 23, 2025 at 3:06 PM
🚨Very happy that my PhD work is now out in @nature.com!
We discovered that evolution, by acting in the midbrain, shifted the threshold to escape in Peromyscus mice, to fine-tune defensive strategies in different environments
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
This was a truly collaborative effort! 🧵⬇️
We discovered that evolution, by acting in the midbrain, shifted the threshold to escape in Peromyscus mice, to fine-tune defensive strategies in different environments
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
This was a truly collaborative effort! 🧵⬇️
Reposted by Tim Sainburg
Very happy to share the latest from my postdoc!
10 yrs of mouse social networks + 1.25 yrs of acoustic data ➡️ insight into vocalization & sociality in a wild population of your favorite lab model 🐁
paper: bit.ly/4n93yyD
data: bit.ly/4lfFBEk
code: bit.ly/4kNnMwx
#bioacoustics #neuroskyence
1/8
10 yrs of mouse social networks + 1.25 yrs of acoustic data ➡️ insight into vocalization & sociality in a wild population of your favorite lab model 🐁
paper: bit.ly/4n93yyD
data: bit.ly/4lfFBEk
code: bit.ly/4kNnMwx
#bioacoustics #neuroskyence
1/8
June 18, 2025 at 6:26 PM
Very happy to share the latest from my postdoc!
10 yrs of mouse social networks + 1.25 yrs of acoustic data ➡️ insight into vocalization & sociality in a wild population of your favorite lab model 🐁
paper: bit.ly/4n93yyD
data: bit.ly/4lfFBEk
code: bit.ly/4kNnMwx
#bioacoustics #neuroskyence
1/8
10 yrs of mouse social networks + 1.25 yrs of acoustic data ➡️ insight into vocalization & sociality in a wild population of your favorite lab model 🐁
paper: bit.ly/4n93yyD
data: bit.ly/4lfFBEk
code: bit.ly/4kNnMwx
#bioacoustics #neuroskyence
1/8
Reposted by Tim Sainburg
1/8 Decoding Dolphin Communication
After studying 313 dolphins (in Sarasota, Florida) for over 40 years and across six generations, a catalog of their vocalizations has been produced.
These vocalizations are more complex than expected.
(preprint) www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...
After studying 313 dolphins (in Sarasota, Florida) for over 40 years and across six generations, a catalog of their vocalizations has been produced.
These vocalizations are more complex than expected.
(preprint) www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...
May 9, 2025 at 3:15 PM
1/8 Decoding Dolphin Communication
After studying 313 dolphins (in Sarasota, Florida) for over 40 years and across six generations, a catalog of their vocalizations has been produced.
These vocalizations are more complex than expected.
(preprint) www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...
After studying 313 dolphins (in Sarasota, Florida) for over 40 years and across six generations, a catalog of their vocalizations has been produced.
These vocalizations are more complex than expected.
(preprint) www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...
Reposted by Tim Sainburg
Our latest superb starling work in @nature.com. We observe long-term reciprocal helping relationships, and suggest reciprocity is an underappreciated mechanism promoting the stability of cooperatively breeding societies. Led by Alexis Earl and @gerrycarter.bsky.social
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
A cryptic role for reciprocal helping in a cooperatively breeding bird - Nature
A study of the cooperative breeding behaviour of superb starlings during 40 consecutive breeding seasons over 20 years reveals long-term reciprocal helping between both related and unrelated individua...
www.nature.com
May 7, 2025 at 3:24 PM
Our latest superb starling work in @nature.com. We observe long-term reciprocal helping relationships, and suggest reciprocity is an underappreciated mechanism promoting the stability of cooperatively breeding societies. Led by Alexis Earl and @gerrycarter.bsky.social
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
My talk at COSYNE is up: "Discrete actions are a unit of both behavior and evolutionary selection" with @akautt.bsky.social and @dattalab.bsky.social www.youtube.com/live/Y8Ke6HC...
Cosyne 2025 - Session 9: Building blocks of cognition
YouTube video by Cosyne Talks
www.youtube.com
March 30, 2025 at 3:51 PM
My talk at COSYNE is up: "Discrete actions are a unit of both behavior and evolutionary selection" with @akautt.bsky.social and @dattalab.bsky.social www.youtube.com/live/Y8Ke6HC...
Reposted by Tim Sainburg
Expectation-driven sensory adaptations support enhanced acuity during categorical perception in European starlings 🧠🧪
@timsainburg.bsky.social
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
@timsainburg.bsky.social
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
Expectation-driven sensory adaptations support enhanced acuity during categorical perception - Nature Neuroscience
Bayesian models explain how context biases perceptual behavior toward expected categories, but sensory neurons do not reflect this bias. Instead, expectation sharpens sensory acuity, independent of do...
www.nature.com
March 20, 2025 at 2:48 PM
Expectation-driven sensory adaptations support enhanced acuity during categorical perception in European starlings 🧠🧪
@timsainburg.bsky.social
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
@timsainburg.bsky.social
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
Reposted by Tim Sainburg
Sensory populations reflect the Bayesian likelihood. And expectation modulates sensory activity. But here’s the twist: sensory neurons don’t integrate the likelihood and prior expectation. (6/n)
March 17, 2025 at 3:05 PM
Sensory populations reflect the Bayesian likelihood. And expectation modulates sensory activity. But here’s the twist: sensory neurons don’t integrate the likelihood and prior expectation. (6/n)
Our brains use prediction in two seemingly contradictory ways. Our latest paper, just published in @natureneuro.bsky.social, investigates how we do it. 1/n
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
Expectation-driven sensory adaptations support enhanced acuity during categorical perception - Nature Neuroscience
Bayesian models explain how context biases perceptual behavior toward expected categories, but sensory neurons do not reflect this bias. Instead, expectation sharpens sensory acuity, independent of do...
www.nature.com
March 17, 2025 at 3:05 PM
Our brains use prediction in two seemingly contradictory ways. Our latest paper, just published in @natureneuro.bsky.social, investigates how we do it. 1/n
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
Reposted by Tim Sainburg
Proud to have contributed to @jiaxuanqi.bsky.social's masterpiece out @nature.com! She shows that dopamine transients track the learned quality of song during juvenile learning and that dopamine release is driven not just by VTA firing, but by a local cholinergic mechanism! (1/x)
Dual neuromodulatory dynamics underlie birdsong learning - Nature
Dopamine release in the basal ganglia of the zebra finch is driven by neurons associated with reinforcement learning and by cholinergic signalling, and tracks performance quality during long-term lear...
www.nature.com
March 12, 2025 at 4:54 PM
Proud to have contributed to @jiaxuanqi.bsky.social's masterpiece out @nature.com! She shows that dopamine transients track the learned quality of song during juvenile learning and that dopamine release is driven not just by VTA firing, but by a local cholinergic mechanism! (1/x)
Reposted by Tim Sainburg
OK If we are moving to Bluesky I am rescuing my favourite ever twitter thread (Jan 2019).
The renamed:
Bluesky-sized history of neuroscience (biased by my interests)
The renamed:
Bluesky-sized history of neuroscience (biased by my interests)
December 1, 2024 at 8:29 PM
OK If we are moving to Bluesky I am rescuing my favourite ever twitter thread (Jan 2019).
The renamed:
Bluesky-sized history of neuroscience (biased by my interests)
The renamed:
Bluesky-sized history of neuroscience (biased by my interests)
Reposted by Tim Sainburg
I recently wrote a primer on UMAP for Nature Reviews Primers. If you are looking for an overview of the method, a getting started primer, or best practices it is a good place to start.
rdcu.be/d0YZT
rdcu.be/d0YZT
Uniform manifold approximation and projection
Nature Reviews Methods Primers - Uniform manifold approximation and projection is a dimensionality reduction technique used to visualize and understand high-dimensional data. In this Primer, Healy...
rdcu.be
November 22, 2024 at 12:02 AM
I recently wrote a primer on UMAP for Nature Reviews Primers. If you are looking for an overview of the method, a getting started primer, or best practices it is a good place to start.
rdcu.be/d0YZT
rdcu.be/d0YZT
Reposted by Tim Sainburg
Come to learn about the specific corticostriatal synapses that drive juvenile birdsong learning!
This Thursday 11:25 Central European Time (5:25 am for me in EST, but early bird gets the worm after all)
This Thursday 11:25 Central European Time (5:25 am for me in EST, but early bird gets the worm after all)
I'll be presenting my work:
"A synaptic locus of song learning"
at the (virtual) Swedish Basal Ganglia Society conference next Thursday (Dec. 5) at 11:25-11:45 CET
Registration is free at this link, and check out the other talks!
swebags.ebrains.se/programme-2/
"A synaptic locus of song learning"
at the (virtual) Swedish Basal Ganglia Society conference next Thursday (Dec. 5) at 11:25-11:45 CET
Registration is free at this link, and check out the other talks!
swebags.ebrains.se/programme-2/
Programme - SWEBAGS
December 5th, (all times CET) Registration: https://swebags.ebrains.se/swebags-conference-2024/swebags-conference-2024-registration/ Abstract Book: Only logged in members Programme: download .pdf Prog...
swebags.ebrains.se
December 2, 2024 at 4:51 PM
Come to learn about the specific corticostriatal synapses that drive juvenile birdsong learning!
This Thursday 11:25 Central European Time (5:25 am for me in EST, but early bird gets the worm after all)
This Thursday 11:25 Central European Time (5:25 am for me in EST, but early bird gets the worm after all)
Reposted by Tim Sainburg
They asked six questions:
* Do you have a criminal history?
* Do you have potentially embarrassing news stories about your personal history?
* Do you oppose mandates in general?
* Do you oppose vaccine mandates?
* Do you support or oppose vaccines?
* Would you be able to move to DC?
* Do you have a criminal history?
* Do you have potentially embarrassing news stories about your personal history?
* Do you oppose mandates in general?
* Do you oppose vaccine mandates?
* Do you support or oppose vaccines?
* Would you be able to move to DC?
November 27, 2024 at 2:13 PM
They asked six questions:
* Do you have a criminal history?
* Do you have potentially embarrassing news stories about your personal history?
* Do you oppose mandates in general?
* Do you oppose vaccine mandates?
* Do you support or oppose vaccines?
* Would you be able to move to DC?
* Do you have a criminal history?
* Do you have potentially embarrassing news stories about your personal history?
* Do you oppose mandates in general?
* Do you oppose vaccine mandates?
* Do you support or oppose vaccines?
* Would you be able to move to DC?
Reposted by Tim Sainburg
My paper is out!! 🎉
"Opponent control of reinforcement by striatal dopamine and serotonin", @Nature
Here, we show that dopamine and serotonin signals form a gas-brake system for reward in the mammalian brain
THREAD ⬇️
1/n
"Opponent control of reinforcement by striatal dopamine and serotonin", @Nature
Here, we show that dopamine and serotonin signals form a gas-brake system for reward in the mammalian brain
THREAD ⬇️
1/n
November 25, 2024 at 4:31 PM
My paper is out!! 🎉
"Opponent control of reinforcement by striatal dopamine and serotonin", @Nature
Here, we show that dopamine and serotonin signals form a gas-brake system for reward in the mammalian brain
THREAD ⬇️
1/n
"Opponent control of reinforcement by striatal dopamine and serotonin", @Nature
Here, we show that dopamine and serotonin signals form a gas-brake system for reward in the mammalian brain
THREAD ⬇️
1/n
Reposted by Tim Sainburg
🔥🔥🚨 Deadline coming up! But still in time to apply to a MindCore fellowship as a postdoc. I’m looking for an independent postdoc with experience in freely moving ephys to perform triple Neuropixel in the wild Agouti!! Get in touch! 🧪https://mindcore.sas.upenn.edu/post-doctoral-research-fellowship/
Postdoctoral Research Fellowship | MindCORE
mindcore.sas.upenn.edu
November 21, 2024 at 4:26 PM
🔥🔥🚨 Deadline coming up! But still in time to apply to a MindCore fellowship as a postdoc. I’m looking for an independent postdoc with experience in freely moving ephys to perform triple Neuropixel in the wild Agouti!! Get in touch! 🧪https://mindcore.sas.upenn.edu/post-doctoral-research-fellowship/
Reposted by Tim Sainburg
🧵 A huge thanks to the creators of umap-learn for their work on UMAP! While trying to get parametric UMAP to work for my project, I ran into some challenges, so I decided to dive in and build my own PyTorch-based version from scratch. You can check it up here github.com/mr-fcharles/...
GitHub - mr-fcharles/parametric_umap: A PyTorch implementation of Parametric UMAP (Uniform Manifold Approximation and Projection) for learning low-dimensional parametric embeddings of high-dimensional...
A PyTorch implementation of Parametric UMAP (Uniform Manifold Approximation and Projection) for learning low-dimensional parametric embeddings of high-dimensional data - mr-fcharles/parametric_umap
github.com
November 21, 2024 at 3:57 PM
🧵 A huge thanks to the creators of umap-learn for their work on UMAP! While trying to get parametric UMAP to work for my project, I ran into some challenges, so I decided to dive in and build my own PyTorch-based version from scratch. You can check it up here github.com/mr-fcharles/...
Reposted by Tim Sainburg
hey everyone! i made a list of some useful starter packs (primarily biology/earth sciences with a few bonus things thrown in) to share with friends who have joined bsky in the last week and thought it may be useful for some people here too! 🌍🧪 #SciSky #BioSky docs.google.com/document/d/1...
Starter packs
BIOLOGY Ecology Macroecology https://go.bsky.app/GBn9pNZ Global ecology https://go.bsky.app/V6tN4cv Trait based ecology and evolution https://go.bsky.app/PThMXeX Invasion biology https://go.b...
docs.google.com
November 11, 2024 at 5:41 PM
hey everyone! i made a list of some useful starter packs (primarily biology/earth sciences with a few bonus things thrown in) to share with friends who have joined bsky in the last week and thought it may be useful for some people here too! 🌍🧪 #SciSky #BioSky docs.google.com/document/d/1...
Excited to see Bernie’s work on "A Primer on Deep Learning for Causal Inference" published. We (Bernie) include sample colab notebooks for each section to guide you step-by-step through deep causal inference methods.
journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/...
journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/...
A Primer on Deep Learning for Causal Inference - Bernard J. Koch, Tim Sainburg, Pablo Geraldo Bastías, Song Jiang, Yizhou Sun, Jacob G. Foster, 2024
This primer systematizes the emerging literature on causal inference using deep neural networks under the potential outcomes framework. It provides an intuitive...
journals.sagepub.com
November 20, 2024 at 1:14 AM
Excited to see Bernie’s work on "A Primer on Deep Learning for Causal Inference" published. We (Bernie) include sample colab notebooks for each section to guide you step-by-step through deep causal inference methods.
journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/...
journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/...
Reposted by Tim Sainburg
We were actually "unknown" for it, but for years @neuroshea.bsky.social and I ran the bsdneuro account, which now rests in a grave befitting Bob (and his cortex).
I have a game. What were you "known" for on Twitter?
I'll go first. I'm the woman who caused Dave Ramsey to mass-block Royals Twitter.
I'll go first. I'm the woman who caused Dave Ramsey to mass-block Royals Twitter.
November 15, 2024 at 8:01 PM
We were actually "unknown" for it, but for years @neuroshea.bsky.social and I ran the bsdneuro account, which now rests in a grave befitting Bob (and his cortex).