Blue Brain Seminar – Point-neuron models of the cerebellum, the role of distributed plasticity explained by closed-loop experiments

Blue Brain is delighted to announce that the next seminar in the series in Neural Computation, will be on ‘Point-neuron models of the cerebellum, the role of distributed plasticity explained by closed-loop experiments.’

The seminar will be given by Alberto Antonietti, from Nearlab – NeuroEngineering and Medical Robotics Laboratory, Department of Electronics, Information and Bioengineering, Politecnico di Milano.

Bio: Alberto Antonietti received his Ph.D. in Bioengineering in May 2018 at Politecnico di Milano, Italy. He has been working on computational neuroscience topics related to motor learning, focusing in particular on spiking neural network models inspired to the cerebellum. He has been active in scientific communities of neuroinformatics and bioengineering, with a keen interest in promoting open and reproducible science.

Abstract: The cerebellar circuit is actively involved in sensorimotor control and adaptation. During natural learning, synaptic plasticity in the cerebellum is thought to evolve dynamically and redistribute within and among subcircuits. This process should emerge in plastic neural networks developing under behavioral feedback and should involve changes distributed across multiple synaptic sites. We have reconstructed a realistic point-neuron cerebellar model, simplifying biophysically detailed neuronal models, and we embedded multiple plasticity rules imitating those revealed experimentally. A single model was able to drive learning in various paradigms, expressing a complex repertoire of responses. The model was then tuned to fit experimental data, estimating the underlying learning time-constants. This process was characterized by a differential development of long-term potentiation and depression at individual synapses, with a progressive accumulation of plasticity distributed over the whole network. Importantly, the model was also able to capture the alterations caused by cerebellar Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation (TMS). This observation reveals dynamic redistribution of changes over the entire network and suggests how TMS affects local circuit computation and memory processing in the cerebellum.

The seminar is an open event, at the Blue Brain offices in the Campus Biotech, Geneva. Upon arrival at the Campus Biotech, please sign in at the Campus Biotech reception.

How to get to the Seminar – https://www.epfl.ch/research/domains/bluebrain/blue-brain/contact/

Organization Host: Srikanth Ramaswamy, Group Leader and Senior Scientist, Blue Brain Project

Contact For more information, please contact [email protected]

Accessibility Informed public

Admittance Free

Date 03/07/2019