Oscillatory control of cortical space as a computational dimension Chen et al. show that alpha/beta oscillations form spatially structured patterns across the cortical surface that encode task context and dynamically gate the expression of sensory information in spik...

Oscillatory control of cortical space as a computational dimension (2025)

www.cell.com/current-biol...

A self-licking ice cream cone is a programme/policy that generates activity, and produces indicators of its own success, but does not achieve its announced goals... instead, it undermines them, while at the same time sucking in ever more resources from worthy and effective activities.

A beautiful loop: An active inference theory of consciousness (2025)

New theory proposes active inference can ground 3 conditions for consciousness: An epistemic field (world model), Bayesian binding, and epistemic depth.

Discusses implications for silicon.

www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

Preprint reviews evidence for the Allostatic Theory of Oxytocin, suggesting it isn't a love-hormone/social-salience-modulator.

Instead, it increases plasticity, and flexibility, while reducing anxiety, and the effects of stress, to create a 'window of adaptation' to change.

osf.io/preprints/os...

u.s. department of energy post on x praising coal: "She's an icon She's a legend And she is the moment [sparkly picture of coal]

struggling with an analogy here but imagine NASA posting a meme about how excited they are to return aviation to the pre-jet age

... like NVIDIA announcing its new GPUs will run on vacuum tubes.

It would be nice to try and tease this out in another order, maybe cetaceans?

It may be bidirectional where ecological niche supports bigger brains -> mechanical effects on brain morphology support richer computation -> increases behavioural capacity to exploit niche -> loop de doo

A cellular entity retaining only its replicative core: Hidden archaeal lineage with an ultra-reduced genome Defining the minimal genetic requirements for cellular life remains a fundamental question in biology. Genomic exploration continually reveals novel microbial lineages, often exhibiting extreme genome...

So cool, a novel archaeon with a super small genome and no metabolic genes!
"An unprecedented level of metabolic dependence on a host, a condition that challenges the functional distinctions between minimal cellular life and viruses."
www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

Inferring context-dependent computations through linear approximations of prefrontal cortex dynamics PFC neural responses during contextual decision-making are consistent with both recurrent and input-driven flexible computations.

Inferring context-dependent computations through linear approximations of prefrontal cortex dynamics
www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...
#neuroscience

Frontiers | Three distinct gamma oscillatory networks within cortical columns in macaque monkeys’ area V1 IntroductionA fundamental property of the neocortex is its columnar organization in many species. Generally, neurons of the same column share stimulus prefer...

Three distinct gamma oscillatory networks within cortical columns in macaque monkeys’ area V1
www.frontiersin.org/journals/neu...
#neuroscience

This is the task that I want an agentic AI optimized for: Give it a paper and have it try to systematically verify the integrity of every single citation.

I want to see this kind of feature baked into the summarisation bots.

New work from the lab of Chengtian Zhao at Ocean University of China 🇨🇳 🐟

I just found one! go.bsky.app/QPFZpj9

The gamma rhythm as a guardian of brain health Fast oscillations (30-150Hz), generated by internal brain mechanisms may be essential for the maintenance of healthy brain function.

Setting a good rhythm for my Sunday with this new eLife review from Ichim…Muresan on gamma oscillations - from neural processing to brain maintenance. Brain rhythms for breakfast. 1/10 #neuroscience 🧪🧠

Stress disrupts engram ensembles in lateral amygdala to generalize threat memory in mice Stress induces aversive memory overgeneralization, a hallmark of many psychiatric disorders. Memories are encoded by a sparse ensemble of neurons acti…

xcited to share our new results! We (huge team effort led by post-doc extraordinaire Sylvie Lesuis) examined the effects of acute stress on threat memory generalization and engram ensemble architecture.
www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

Nature paper article with title and abstract

🌟 Cai Lab Nature (@natureportfolio.bsky.social) paper alert! In work led by Joe Zaki, we find that rest periods after learning not only stabilize new memories BUT ALSO integrate new memories with older ones from days past! (1/10)

Read it here: www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Ventral frontostriatal circuitry mediates the computation of reinforcement from symbolic gains and losses Tang et al. show that OFC plays a more important role in learning from symbolic reinforcers than subcortical structures. OFC computes reinforcement signals and sends the information to the VS through ...

Our paper is published in the latest issue of NEURON. We examined the neural mechanisms involved in learning from the gains and losses of symbolic reinforcers in the ventral frontostriatal circuitry. 🧠
www.cell.com/neuron/abstr...

Stress can disrupt memory and lead to needless anxiety — here’s how In mice, stress altered the way that the brain formed memories, resulting in an unnecessary fear response.

Nature

Stress can disrupt memory and lead to needless anxiety — here’s how

In mice, stress altered the way that the brain formed memories, resulting in an unnecessary fear response.

www.nature.com/articles/d41...

A tale of two algorithms: Structured slots explain prefrontal sequence memory and are unified with hippocampal cognitive maps The algorithm of the prefrontal working memory system on sequence memory tasks is not well understood, whereas it is well understood for the hippocampal episodic memory system. This work shows a mathe...

A tale of two algorithms: Structured slots explain prefrontal sequence memory and are unified with hippocampal cognitive maps
www.cell.com/neuron/fullt...
#Neuroscience