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The Cognitive and Systems Neuroscience Group at the University of Amsterdam is seeking a highly qualified and motivated candidate for a PhD position in Computational Neuroscience. The position falls under the Horizon Health Europe Consortium grant “Virtual Brain Twins for Personalized Treatment of Psychiatric Disorders”. This Consortium constitutes a large collaboration between different European institutions, aiming to develop personalized brain simulation software (“virtual brain twins”) to improve the diagnosis and treatment of schizophrenia. The main objective of this PhD project is to develop a biologically realistic computational model of the human brain, and use it to study alterations in brain activity associated with schizophrenia. Such model will make use of local neural mass models (developed by our Consortium partners) to simulate multiple brain areas, and will bring them together using structural connectivity data from human subjects. The model will be then used to explore the effects of schizophrenia-related alterations in brain dynamics and function, and to derive patient-specific virtual brain simulations to improve diagnosis and explore treatments in collaboration with clinical Consortium partners. The project will be supervised by Dr. Jorge Mejias, principal investigator in computational neuroscience and leader of the Dutch component of the Consortium, and by Prof. Dr. Cyriel Pennartz, head of the Cognitive and Systems Neuroscience Group. You will closely collaborate with other Consortium members, particularly with the team of Prof. Viktor Jirsa at Aix-Marseille University, and will also benefit from interactions with local colleagues including other theoretical, computational and experimental neuroscientists at the Cognitive and Systems Neuroscience Group. For more information and to apply, visit the following link: https://vacatures.uva.nl/UvA/job/PhD-position-in-Computational-Neuroscience/786924102/

We are looking for a postdoctoral researcher to study the effects of neuromodulators in biologically realistic networks and learning tasks in the Vidi project 'Top-down neuromodulation and bottom-up network computation, a computational study'. You will use cellular and behavioural data gathered by our department over the previous five years on dopamine, acetylcholine and serotonin in mouse barrel cortex, to bridge the gap between single cell, network and behavioural effects. The aim of this project is to explain the effects of neuromodulation on task performance in biologically realistic spiking recurrent neural networks (SRNNs). You will use biologically realistic learning frameworks, such as force learning, to study how network structure influences task performance. You will use existing open source data to train a SRNN on a pole detection task (for rodents using their whiskers) and incorporate realistic network properties of the (barrel) cortex based on our lab's measurements. Next, you will incorporate the cellular effects of dopamine, acetylcholine and serotonin that we have measured into the network, and investigate their effects on task performance. In particular, you will research the effects of biologically realistic network properties (balance between excitation and inhibition and the resulting chaotic activity, non-linear neuronal input-output relations, patterns in connectivity, Dale's law) and incorporate known neuron and network effects. You will build on the single cell data, network models and analysis methods available in our group, and your results will be incorporated into our group's further research to develop and validate efficient coding models of (somatosensory) perception. We are therefore looking for a team player who can collaborate well with the other group members, and is willing to both learn from them and share their knowledge.

The Grossman Center for Quantitative Biology and Human Behavior at the University of Chicago seeks outstanding applicants for multiple postdoctoral positions in computational and theoretical neuroscience.

A two-year postdoctoral position in computational neuroscience and neural coding is open to investigate the role of hippocampal-dependent memory function in visual perceptual learning. The postdoc will work in Eugenio Piasini's group at the International School for Advanced Studies (SISSA), in close collaboration with Manuela Allegra at the Italian National Research Council (CNR).

A postdoctoral position is available for a project with Matthew Chalk (https://matthewjchalk.wixsite.com/mysite), at the Vision Institute (www.institut-vision.org/en/), within the Sorbonne Université, in Paris, France. The project will involve investigating principles of neural coding in the retina. Specifically, the project will investigate how different coding objectives, such as optimising efficiency or encoding predictive information, can explain the diverse ways that neurons in the retina respond to visual stimulation. The project will extend previous work by Chalk et al. to develop a general theory of optimal neural coding (Chalk et al. PNAS 2018, Chalk et al. 2022 biorxiv). For this, we will use a range of computational techniques including gaussian processes (Goldin et al. 2023 PNAS) and information theory. The project is part of an exciting interdisciplinary collaboration between theorists and experimentalists at the Vision Institute (Olivier Marre; http://oliviermarre.free.fr), and Thomas Euler (https://eulerlab.de) and Philip Berens (https://www.eye-tuebingen.de/berenslab/) at Tuebingen University. The Vision Institute is a stimulating environment for brain research. It brings together in a single building researchers, clinicians and industrial partners in order to discover, test and develop treatments and technological innovations for the benefit of visually impaired patients. The candidate will have a PhD with a strong, quantitative background (ideally in fields such as machine learning, theoretical neuroscience or physics). They will have a good grasp of oral and written English (French is not required). Most of all, they will enjoy tackling new problems with enthusiasm and as part of a team. The position is funded for three years. Applications should include a CV, a statement of research interests (~ 1 page), and two letters of recommendation. Electronic submissions in pdf-format are preferred and should be sent to Matthew Chalk (matthewjchalk@gmail.com). Feel free to ask any informal questions about the position if you are interested.

I will be looking for students through the Cognition and Perception program at NYU: https://as.nyu.edu/departments/psychology/graduate/phd-cognition-perception.html Projects will fit into the research descriptions provided here: https://lindsay-lab.github.io/research/

The Lindsay Lab is looking for a post-doc to work on either of the first two research directions listed here: https://lindsay-lab.github.io/research/ (i.e. modeling attention with artificial neural networks or using ANNs to test methods from neuroscience). The post is funded for two years.

We are looking for a postdoctoral researcher to work on the Vidi project 'Top-down neuromodulation and bottom-up network computation, a computational study' and study the effects of neuromodulators in balanced networks. You will use cellular and behavioural data on the effects of dopamine, acetylcholine and serotonin in mouse barrel cortex gathered by our department over the past five years, to bridge the gap between single cell, network and behavioural effects. You will use the balanced network framework to study network activity under neuromodulation. In order to do this, you will develop a balanced network description of the barrel cortex, with realistic barrel cortex properties (see https://doi.org/10.1007/s12021-022-09576-5). Next, you will incorporate the cellular effects of dopamine, acetylcholine and serotonin that we have measured over the previous years (see https://doi.org/10.1093/gigascience/giy147 and https://doi.org/10.1101/2022.01.12.476007) into the network, and investigate their effects on overall network activity and behaviour. More particularly, through simulations and analytical derivations, you will research the effects of neuromodulators on the stability of the balanced state, synchrony, regularity and chaos. You will build on the single cell data, models and analysis methods available in our group, and your results will be incorporated into our group's further research to develop and validate machine learning and efficient coding models of (somatosensory) perception. We are therefore looking for a team player who can work well with our other group members and is willing to both learn from them and share their knowledge.

A new NIH-funded collaboration between David Prober (Caltech), Thai Truong (USC) and Geoff Goodhill (Washington University in St Louis) aims to gain new insight into the neural circuits underlying sleep, through a combination of whole-brain neural recordings in zebrafish and theoretical/computational modeling. The Goodhill lab is now looking for 2 postdocs for the modeling and computational analysis components. Using novel 2-photon imaging technologies Prober and Truong will record from the entire larval zebrafish brain at single-neuron resolution continuously for long periods of time, examining neural circuit activity during normal day-night cycles and in response to genetic and pharmacological perturbations. The Goodhill lab will analyze the resulting huge datasets using a variety of sophisticated computational approaches, and use these results to build new theoretical models that reveal how neural circuits interact to govern sleep. Theoretical and experimental work will be intimately linked.

The Center for Neuroscience and Cell Biology of the University of Coimbra (CNC-UC) is seeking an enthusiastic PostDoctoral researcher to work at the interface between Behavioral, Systems and Computational Neuroscience. Supported by the European Union's Horizon 2020 Research and Innovation programme, under the project DYNABRAIN, the PostDoctoral fellow will conduct research activities in modelling and simulation of reward-modulated prosocial behavior and decision-making. The position is part of a larger effort to uncover the computational and mechanistic bases of prosociality and empathy at the behavioral and circuit levels and will be co-supervised by Cristina Marquez and Renato Duarte. It offers a great opportunity to work at the interface between experimental data (animal behavior and electrophysiology) and theoretical modelling (emphasis on Multi-Agent Reinforcement Learning and neural population dynamics) and to be part of a dynamic, friendly and stimulating research group. Based in Coimbra and Cantanhede and embedded in one of Europe's oldest Universities and a UNESCO World Heritage site, the CNC-UC has a vibrant neuroscience community and the region offers exceptional quality of life.