Samuel Liebana
@samuel-liebana.bsky.social
Research Fellow at the Gatsby Unit, UCL
Q: How do we learn?
Q: How do we learn?
Pinned
Dopamine encodes deep network teaching signals for individual learning trajectories
Longitudinal tracking of long-term learning behavior and striatal dopamine reveals
that dopamine teaching signals shape individually diverse yet systematic learning
trajectories, captured mathematical...
www.cell.com
Does the brain learn by gradient descent?
It's a pleasure to share our paper at @cp-cell.bsky.social, showing how mice learning over long timescales display key hallmarks of gradient descent (GD).
The culmination of my PhD supervised by @laklab.bsky.social, @saxelab.bsky.social and Rafal Bogacz!
It's a pleasure to share our paper at @cp-cell.bsky.social, showing how mice learning over long timescales display key hallmarks of gradient descent (GD).
The culmination of my PhD supervised by @laklab.bsky.social, @saxelab.bsky.social and Rafal Bogacz!
Reposted by Samuel Liebana
Adopting an engineering mindset will help the field focus its research priorities, writes @timothyoleary.bsky.social.
#neuroskyence
www.thetransmitter.org/systems-neur...
#neuroskyence
www.thetransmitter.org/systems-neur...
Neuroscience needs engineers—for more reasons than you think
Adopting an engineering mindset will help the field focus its research priorities.
www.thetransmitter.org
November 10, 2025 at 6:56 PM
Adopting an engineering mindset will help the field focus its research priorities, writes @timothyoleary.bsky.social.
#neuroskyence
www.thetransmitter.org/systems-neur...
#neuroskyence
www.thetransmitter.org/systems-neur...
Honored to have a research highlight featuring our work!
A comprehensive overview of our results and their impact for future research and applications:
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
A comprehensive overview of our results and their impact for future research and applications:
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
Dopamine as a teaching signal: understanding its role in shaping individual behavior - Signal Transduction and Targeted Therapy
Signal Transduction and Targeted Therapy - Dopamine as a teaching signal: understanding its role in shaping individual behavior
www.nature.com
November 10, 2025 at 1:29 PM
Honored to have a research highlight featuring our work!
A comprehensive overview of our results and their impact for future research and applications:
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
A comprehensive overview of our results and their impact for future research and applications:
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
Reposted by Samuel Liebana
I’m super excited to finally put my recent work with @behrenstimb.bsky.social on bioRxiv, where we develop a new mechanistic theory of how PFC structures adaptive behaviour using attractor dynamics in space and time!
www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...
www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...
September 24, 2025 at 12:04 PM
I’m super excited to finally put my recent work with @behrenstimb.bsky.social on bioRxiv, where we develop a new mechanistic theory of how PFC structures adaptive behaviour using attractor dynamics in space and time!
www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...
www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...
Reposted by Samuel Liebana
In our Learning Club @cmc-lab.bsky.social today (Aug 18, Thu, 2pm CET), Samuel Liebana will tell us about his paper (www.cell.com/cell/fulltex... [joint work w/ @saxelab.bsky.social & @laklab.bsky.social]. Want to attend, send an empty email to virtual-talk-link-request@cmclab.org to get the link!
www.cell.com
September 18, 2025 at 7:44 AM
In our Learning Club @cmc-lab.bsky.social today (Aug 18, Thu, 2pm CET), Samuel Liebana will tell us about his paper (www.cell.com/cell/fulltex... [joint work w/ @saxelab.bsky.social & @laklab.bsky.social]. Want to attend, send an empty email to virtual-talk-link-request@cmclab.org to get the link!
Reposted by Samuel Liebana
🚨Our preprint is online!🚨
www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...
How do #dopamine neurons perform the key calculations in reinforcement #learning?
Read on to find out more! 🧵
www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...
How do #dopamine neurons perform the key calculations in reinforcement #learning?
Read on to find out more! 🧵
September 19, 2025 at 1:05 PM
🚨Our preprint is online!🚨
www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...
How do #dopamine neurons perform the key calculations in reinforcement #learning?
Read on to find out more! 🧵
www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...
How do #dopamine neurons perform the key calculations in reinforcement #learning?
Read on to find out more! 🧵
Reposted by Samuel Liebana
Beautiful and clear results showing that temporal difference error calculation is hardwired in the dopamine/striatum mircocircuits: www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...
from @malcolmgcampbell.bsky.social and @naoshigeuchida.bsky.social
from @malcolmgcampbell.bsky.social and @naoshigeuchida.bsky.social
A hardwired neural circuit for temporal difference learning
The neurotransmitter dopamine plays a major role in learning by acting as a teaching signal to update the brain's predictions about rewards. A leading theory proposes that this process is analogous to...
www.biorxiv.org
September 20, 2025 at 11:36 AM
Beautiful and clear results showing that temporal difference error calculation is hardwired in the dopamine/striatum mircocircuits: www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...
from @malcolmgcampbell.bsky.social and @naoshigeuchida.bsky.social
from @malcolmgcampbell.bsky.social and @naoshigeuchida.bsky.social
Reposted by Samuel Liebana
Read the full paper ‘Dopamine encodes deep network teaching signals for individual learning trajectories’ in @cellpress.bsky.social ⬇️
www.cell.com/cell/fulltex...
@yulonglilab.bsky.social
@saxelab.bsky.social
@oxforddpag.bsky.social
@laklab.bsky.social
www.cell.com/cell/fulltex...
@yulonglilab.bsky.social
@saxelab.bsky.social
@oxforddpag.bsky.social
@laklab.bsky.social
Dopamine encodes deep network teaching signals for individual learning trajectories
Longitudinal tracking of long-term learning behavior and striatal dopamine reveals
that dopamine teaching signals shape individually diverse yet systematic learning
trajectories, captured mathematical...
www.cell.com
June 11, 2025 at 3:08 PM
Read the full paper ‘Dopamine encodes deep network teaching signals for individual learning trajectories’ in @cellpress.bsky.social ⬇️
www.cell.com/cell/fulltex...
@yulonglilab.bsky.social
@saxelab.bsky.social
@oxforddpag.bsky.social
@laklab.bsky.social
www.cell.com/cell/fulltex...
@yulonglilab.bsky.social
@saxelab.bsky.social
@oxforddpag.bsky.social
@laklab.bsky.social
Reposted by Samuel Liebana
Super excited to see this paper from Armin Lak & colleagues out! (I've seen @saxelab.bsky.social present it before.)
www.cell.com/cell/fulltex...
tl;dr: The learning trajectories that individual mice take correspond to different saddle points in a deep net's loss landscape.
🧠📈 🧪 #NeuroAI
www.cell.com/cell/fulltex...
tl;dr: The learning trajectories that individual mice take correspond to different saddle points in a deep net's loss landscape.
🧠📈 🧪 #NeuroAI
Dopamine encodes deep network teaching signals for individual learning trajectories
Longitudinal tracking of long-term learning behavior and striatal dopamine reveals
that dopamine teaching signals shape individually diverse yet systematic learning
trajectories, captured mathematical...
www.cell.com
July 10, 2025 at 6:29 PM
Super excited to see this paper from Armin Lak & colleagues out! (I've seen @saxelab.bsky.social present it before.)
www.cell.com/cell/fulltex...
tl;dr: The learning trajectories that individual mice take correspond to different saddle points in a deep net's loss landscape.
🧠📈 🧪 #NeuroAI
www.cell.com/cell/fulltex...
tl;dr: The learning trajectories that individual mice take correspond to different saddle points in a deep net's loss landscape.
🧠📈 🧪 #NeuroAI
Reposted by Samuel Liebana
How does in-context learning emerge in attention models during gradient descent training?
Sharing our new Spotlight paper @icmlconf.bsky.social: Training Dynamics of In-Context Learning in Linear Attention
arxiv.org/abs/2501.16265
Led by Yedi Zhang with @aaditya6284.bsky.social and Peter Latham
Sharing our new Spotlight paper @icmlconf.bsky.social: Training Dynamics of In-Context Learning in Linear Attention
arxiv.org/abs/2501.16265
Led by Yedi Zhang with @aaditya6284.bsky.social and Peter Latham
June 4, 2025 at 11:22 AM
How does in-context learning emerge in attention models during gradient descent training?
Sharing our new Spotlight paper @icmlconf.bsky.social: Training Dynamics of In-Context Learning in Linear Attention
arxiv.org/abs/2501.16265
Led by Yedi Zhang with @aaditya6284.bsky.social and Peter Latham
Sharing our new Spotlight paper @icmlconf.bsky.social: Training Dynamics of In-Context Learning in Linear Attention
arxiv.org/abs/2501.16265
Led by Yedi Zhang with @aaditya6284.bsky.social and Peter Latham
Reposted by Samuel Liebana
Excited to share new work @icmlconf.bsky.social by Loek van Rossem exploring the development of computational algorithms in recurrent neural networks.
Hear it live tomorrow, Oral 1D, Tues 15 Jul West Exhibition Hall C: icml.cc/virtual/2025...
Paper: openreview.net/forum?id=3go...
(1/11)
Hear it live tomorrow, Oral 1D, Tues 15 Jul West Exhibition Hall C: icml.cc/virtual/2025...
Paper: openreview.net/forum?id=3go...
(1/11)
ICML Poster Algorithm Development in Neural Networks: Insights from the Streaming Parity TaskICML 2025
icml.cc
July 14, 2025 at 9:25 PM
Excited to share new work @icmlconf.bsky.social by Loek van Rossem exploring the development of computational algorithms in recurrent neural networks.
Hear it live tomorrow, Oral 1D, Tues 15 Jul West Exhibition Hall C: icml.cc/virtual/2025...
Paper: openreview.net/forum?id=3go...
(1/11)
Hear it live tomorrow, Oral 1D, Tues 15 Jul West Exhibition Hall C: icml.cc/virtual/2025...
Paper: openreview.net/forum?id=3go...
(1/11)
Does the brain learn by gradient descent?
It's a pleasure to share our paper at @cp-cell.bsky.social, showing how mice learning over long timescales display key hallmarks of gradient descent (GD).
The culmination of my PhD supervised by @laklab.bsky.social, @saxelab.bsky.social and Rafal Bogacz!
It's a pleasure to share our paper at @cp-cell.bsky.social, showing how mice learning over long timescales display key hallmarks of gradient descent (GD).
The culmination of my PhD supervised by @laklab.bsky.social, @saxelab.bsky.social and Rafal Bogacz!
Dopamine encodes deep network teaching signals for individual learning trajectories
Longitudinal tracking of long-term learning behavior and striatal dopamine reveals
that dopamine teaching signals shape individually diverse yet systematic learning
trajectories, captured mathematical...
www.cell.com
June 15, 2025 at 9:33 AM
Does the brain learn by gradient descent?
It's a pleasure to share our paper at @cp-cell.bsky.social, showing how mice learning over long timescales display key hallmarks of gradient descent (GD).
The culmination of my PhD supervised by @laklab.bsky.social, @saxelab.bsky.social and Rafal Bogacz!
It's a pleasure to share our paper at @cp-cell.bsky.social, showing how mice learning over long timescales display key hallmarks of gradient descent (GD).
The culmination of my PhD supervised by @laklab.bsky.social, @saxelab.bsky.social and Rafal Bogacz!
Reposted by Samuel Liebana
Now online! Dopamine encodes deep network teaching signals for individual learning trajectories
Dopamine encodes deep network teaching signals for individual learning trajectories
Longitudinal tracking of long-term learning behavior and striatal dopamine reveals that dopamine teaching signals shape individually diverse yet systematic learning trajectories, captured mathematically by the fixed point structure of a deep neural network.
dlvr.it
June 11, 2025 at 10:38 PM
Now online! Dopamine encodes deep network teaching signals for individual learning trajectories
Reposted by Samuel Liebana
Our work, out at Cell, shows that the brain’s dopamine signals teach each individual a unique learning trajectory. Collaborative experiment-theory effort, led by Sam Liebana in the lab. The first experiment my lab started just shy of 6y ago & v excited to see it out: www.cell.com/cell/fulltex...
June 11, 2025 at 3:18 PM
Our work, out at Cell, shows that the brain’s dopamine signals teach each individual a unique learning trajectory. Collaborative experiment-theory effort, led by Sam Liebana in the lab. The first experiment my lab started just shy of 6y ago & v excited to see it out: www.cell.com/cell/fulltex...
Reposted by Samuel Liebana
New research shows long-term learning is shaped by dopamine signals that act as partial reward prediction errors.
The study in mice reveals how early behavioural biases predict individual learning trajectories.
Find out more ⬇️
www.sainsburywellcome.org/web/blog/lon...
The study in mice reveals how early behavioural biases predict individual learning trajectories.
Find out more ⬇️
www.sainsburywellcome.org/web/blog/lon...
June 11, 2025 at 3:08 PM
New research shows long-term learning is shaped by dopamine signals that act as partial reward prediction errors.
The study in mice reveals how early behavioural biases predict individual learning trajectories.
Find out more ⬇️
www.sainsburywellcome.org/web/blog/lon...
The study in mice reveals how early behavioural biases predict individual learning trajectories.
Find out more ⬇️
www.sainsburywellcome.org/web/blog/lon...