Scientific project design in integrative neurosciences

Summary

In this course, students will investigate causal neuronal network mechanisms underlying sensory-guided decision-making in mice. Students will analyse published data to develop integrative neuroscience research projects including the design of new experiments to test specific falsifiable predictions.

Students will work together in small groups to jointly write a 20-page report to be handed in by the end of the semester, which will count for two-thirds of the final grade.

Each individual student will also give a ~15 minute oral presentation during the semester, which will count for one-third of the final grade.

Content

Neurons function in highly-distributed brain-wide networks which process sensory information and guide flexible goal-directed behavior across diverse timescales according to animal needs in different contexts. New technologies provide increasingly high-resolution measurements of the activity of many individual neurons measured simultaneously across different brain regions offering unprecedented opportunities for investigating neuronal network dynamics. High-density multichannel silicon probes for electrophysiological measurement of extracellular potentials can provide access to the action potential firing times of hundreds of neurons measured simultaneously with millisecond precision during quantified mouse behavior in sensory decision-making tasks. Such data begin to offer the first insights into how dynamic brain-wide neuronal computations might underlie simple cognitive functions, and in this course we will explore two such data sets. We will first discuss relevant literature, and then re-analyse the underlying data to reproduce and extend key published findings. Guided through discussions in class, students will then develop hypotheses for causal neuronal mechanisms underlying specific aspects of the data. Finally, students will design new experiments, models, simulations, and analyses to test specific falsifiable hypotheses.

Assessment

Students will work together in small groups to jointly write a 20-page report to be handed in by the end of the semester, which will count for two-thirds of the final grade.

Each individual student will also give a ~15 minute oral presentation during the semester, which will count for one-third of the final grade.

Pdf files for download

Below you will find pdf files providing important information about the course. Please download and read.

Data and code

Data and code are available at : https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1qdApwNtLr1F-r7UK0S2IRNvZat0FPNJF

Group formation

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1DwDRBXh36nXksxwsI2lPdM3d2NsDeF88eaB07xBQ5EU/edit?gid=0#gid=0