Brain Architecture

The functional architecture of the brain is still largely a mystery. Whilst most neuroscientists focus on local structures and networks, a key theme of BCBT has been to explore theories of the general architecture of the mammalian brain. An example of a general theory is the Distributed Adaptive Control architecture proposed by Paul Verschure. Other lectures featured here investigate the dynamical properties of large-scale brain systems (Murray Shanahan), and the contribution of the frontal cortex to goal-directed behaviour (Aldo Genovesio).



Featured Lectures


Aldo GenovesioAldo Genovesio (2013)

Goal encoding and monitoring in monkey prefrontal cortext


Murray ShanahanMurray Shanahan (2014)

Metastability in neurodynamics


Paul VerschurePaul Verschure (2014)

The neural substrate of intentionality and goal oriented behaviour



Other Lectures


Building meaning from action and perception

Bridging biology and computation in the service of understanding how language evolved

How neuroscience will change our view on consciousness


Reasoning, learning and exploration in human decision-making

The organization of 'higher centers' underlying learning, memory, and the organization of behavioral actions
Goal-directed decision making as probabilistic inference

Cognitive effects on decision-making processes

Seeing the world through the lens of a predictive brain: a neuro-computational model

Saliency maps for spatial attention: insights from mammal-like robots


Role of prefrontal cortex in decision making: across-task interference effects in a duration discrimination task and prediction of other choices in a social interactive task
The construction in confidence


Evolution and analysis of brain-body-environment systems

Mechanisms for generalized CSN arousal: quantitative approaches and their links to sexual arousal

The proactive brain: predictions in visual cognition


The brain in space



Cortical plasticity throughout adulthood: implications on the evolution of the nervous system at the 'nanosecond' scale

Neuronal circuits that link action and perception


The functional logic of an orienting super-hub in the roof of the midbrain

How to combine science and engineering to solve philophical problems

Why does biology need robotics?


Signal processing in vertebrate and invertebrate early visual systems