Emerging Tools for Acquisition and Interpretation of Whole-Brain Functional Data
In the last few years, optical techniques have emerged that allow near-simultaneous acquisition of neuronal activity at the whole-brain level and with single-cell resolution for small model organisms. Given the enormous density of interconnectivity of neurons in the brain, these techniques bear great potential for advancing our understanding of how the information underlying behavior is represented and processed by neuronal networks in a dynamic fashion and at the whole-brain level. At the same time, these new tools have transitioned neuroscience into the field of “Big Data”, where terabytes of data are produced per microscope and day. It is expected that major breakthroughs in coming years will result from making sense of these data sets. This calls for the application of advanced machine learning, statistics tools and mathematical modeling as well as an IT infrastructure capable of handling such data sets efficiently. This meeting brought together experts and pioneers in these fields to identify synergies and new opportunities and to discuss the main challenges moving forward.
Organizers
Philipp Keller, Janelia Research Campus/HHMI
Alipasha Vaziri, Rockefeller University & Research Institute of Molecular Pathology (IMP)
Invited Participants
Larry Abbott, Columbia University College of Physicians & Surgeons
Subutai Ahmad, Numenta
Misha Ahrens, Janelia Research Campus/HHMI
Cori Bargmann, HHMI/Rockefeller University
Kristin Branson, Janelia Research Campus/HHMI
Jerry Chen, University of Zurich
Karl Deisseroth, HHMI/Stanford University
Shaul Druckmann, Janelia Research Campus/HHMI
Valentina Emiliani, Université Paris Descartes
Jeremy Freeman, Janelia Research Campus/HHMI
Peyman Golshani, University of California, Los Angeles
Timothy Holy, Washington University School of Medicine
Matthias Kaschube, Frankfurt Institute for Advanced Studies
Konrad Körding, Northwestern University
Wolfgang Maass, Technische Universität Graz
Michael Orger, Champalimaud Centre for the Unknown
Dan Oron, Weizmann Institute of Science
Alexandre Pouget, University of Rochester
Eftychios Pnevmatikakis, Simons Foundation
Elad Schneidman, Weizmann Institute of Science
Shy Shoham, Technion Israel Institute of Technology
Hari Shroff, National Institute of Biomedical Imaging and Bioengineering, NIH
Spencer Smith, University of North Carolina School of Medicine
Peter So, Massachusetts Insitute of Technology
Joshua Vogelstein, Johns Hopkins University
Frank Wood, University of Oxford
Rafael Yuste, Columbia University
