by prof. Gian Michele Ratto, Consiglio Nazionale delle Ricerche, Pisa

When: May 26th, 2022 – 3:00 pm

Where: Sala Seminari at VIMM

Abstract: Living organisms navigate through a cyclic world: activity, feeding, social interactions
are all organized along the periodic daily rhythm synchronized by external environmental cues and
brain function varies markedly through the day. An obvious contributory factor is the large change
in the level of sensory drive from day to night. Less obvious is the degree to which intrinsic
neuronal activity might vary, yet there is abundant clinical data supporting the idea that many
functional neurological and psychiatric conditions have strong diurnal patterns.

by prof. Nicolas Brunel, Duke University

When: June 16th, 2022 – 3:00 pm

Where: VIMM Meeting room

Abstract: Brains have a remarkable ability to store information about the external world, on time scales that range from seconds to the lifetime of an animal. What are the mechanisms by which information is stored in the brain, and how is stored information retrieved from memory? One of the central hypothesis of neuroscience is that information is stored through synaptic plasticity – modifications of synaptic connectivity between neurons. Theoretical models have explored the impact of such synaptic plasticity mechanisms on network dynamics. One scenario, in which synaptic changes are predominantly temporally symmetric, leads to the creation of fixed point attractor states of the dynamics of the network, one for each item stored in memory.

by prof. Andrea Benucci, RIKEN Center for Brain Science – Saitama – Japan

When: April 28th, 2022 – 10:00 am

Where: Zoom meeting. Recording available on Mediaspace

Abstract: In this presentation, I will first introduce the main areas of interest of my laboratory at RIKEN Center for Brain Science. Then, I will focus on a recent work where we examined the plasticity of visual representations in the mouse cortex.

The starting observation for this study is that brain circuits acquire and update computations through the dynamics of recurrently connected neurons. Neuronal connections are plastic but the principles that coordinate cell-to-cell connectivity changes for network-level computations remain largely elusive.

When: Apr 8th, 2022 – starting at 3:00 pm

Where: Aula Magna, Complesso Beato Pellegrino, Padova

Abstract: Nello splendido contesto del Complesso Beato Pellegrino un evento che vedrà la presenza di esponenti della Regione Veneto e dell’EU Quantum Flagship e di Amazon per affrontare insieme la sfida del computer quantistico.

Il Dipartimento di Fisica e Astronomia (DFA) dell’Università di Padova organizza per il giorno 8 aprile, alle ore 15:00, presso l’Aula Magna del Complesso Beato Pellegrino, il convegno “Padova e la nuova sfida del computer quantistico”, incentrato sul progetto Quantum Computing and Simulation Center (QCSC) del quale il DFA è capofila e coordinatore.