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Andrew MacAskill

@macaskillaf.bsky.social
2.3K followers 2K following 166 posts

UCL neuroscientist investigating the neural basis of contextual decision making. Views are my own. Prof @uclnpp lab website: www.macaskilllab.com UCL profile: profiles.ucl.ac.uk/5194 also @macaskillaf@fediscience.org

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Andrew MacAskill @macaskillaf.bsky.social · 27/09/2026
I tried to explain this to a postdoc recently and they just stared at me blankly...
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Andrew MacAskill @macaskillaf.bsky.social · 17/09/2026
For our generation it's upsetting to see, but for ecrs it is awful - as there is the worry that you will never build the skills in the first place. Most of my teaching now is undoing ai learning and teaching how to think!
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Jim Heys @jim-heys.bsky.social · 03/09/2026
I’m very excited to share our new paper, led by the very talented Jack Bowler, a postdoc in the lab! www.nature.com/articles/s41... We all know that the way we learn something matters. But how does a training curriculum actually shape how the brain learns to solve a problem? a 🧵 1/N
nature.com
Structured experience shapes strategy learning and neural dynamics in the medial entorhinal cortex - Nature Neuroscience
The authors use recurrent neural networks to predict how structured prior experience shapes neural dynamics as mice learn flexible timing strategies during complex context-dependent behavior.
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Andrew MacAskill @macaskillaf.bsky.social · 03/09/2026
Hurray! Great to see this out! Congrats!
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Andrew MacAskill @macaskillaf.bsky.social · 03/09/2026
amazing news congrats!!
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Adam Carter @carterlab.bsky.social · 01/09/2026
Happy to share our new J Neurosci paper showing how cortical and thalamic inputs engage cholinergic interneurons in the nucleus accumbens (NAc) core: www.jneurosci.org/content/earl...
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Andrew MacAskill @macaskillaf.bsky.social · 01/09/2026
i've got to that heady stage where my youtube feed is almost entirely tec house mixes, interspersed with ads for nature family journals and minus 80 freezers 🧪🧠📈🎧 is this old age?
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Caswell Barry @caswell.bsky.social · 01/09/2026
Very excited to see this out — real teamwork, led by @laurenb29.bsky.social & Will de Cothi with @lgiocomo.bsky.social, @colinlever.bsky.social, Laurenz Muessig, Fábio Rodrigues, Francesca Cacucci, Tom Wills, Yanjun Sun & Steven Poulter. In Nature Comms: www.nature.com/articles/s41467-026-76686-y
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Andrew MacAskill @macaskillaf.bsky.social · 30/08/2026
www.mcsweeneys.net/articles/pro...
mcsweeneys.net
Professor Sisyphus Begins a New Semester
“Professor Sisyphus learned a slang word. He was excited to impress his students. Then he discovered that as soon as he uttered slang in class—poof! It would...
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Andrew MacAskill @macaskillaf.bsky.social · 21/08/2026
Thanks! Yeah I think it's degrees - we do see some connectivity just extremely sparse, and low amplitude, especially compared to pfc projections. So consistent I think!
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Andrew MacAskill @macaskillaf.bsky.social · 20/08/2026
Congrats @jespass.bsky.social on her new paper! PFC is widely thought to talk to HPC via nucleus reuniens - but no one has tested if this actual connectivity exists. Turns out it's wired to block it: PFC inputs to reuniens contact only neurons projecting back to PFC, not ones projecting to HPC. 🧪🧠📈
biorxiv.org
Nucleus reuniens is organised as parallel circuits rather than a prefrontal-hippocampal relay
Interactions between the prefrontal cortex (PFC) and hippocampus (HPC) are crucial for flexible and memory guided behaviour. Because there are no direct projections from PFC to HPC, it is widely presu...
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Andrew MacAskill @macaskillaf.bsky.social · 31/07/2026
Agree but my mentors would say never say 'significant'. - just say increase / decrease - the stats speak for themselves!
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Andrew MacAskill @macaskillaf.bsky.social · 21/07/2026
i remember optimism... ts been a while!
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Elisa Fadda @elisafadda.bsky.social · 19/07/2026
"how did you like the half time show, Wayne?" "It was crap" 😂😂😂👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻🔥🔥🔥 #legend
static.klipy.com
Wayne Rooney: Football Legend
Alt: Wayne Rooney: Football Legend
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Poorly Drawn Arsenal @poorlydrawnarsenal.com · 14/07/2026
If I were France I would attempt to score soon. If this match ends as it is now the chances of them advancing are low.
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Andrew MacAskill @macaskillaf.bsky.social · 14/07/2026
' We will also explore the use of AI to increase efficiency in processes across the funding lifecycle and as an operational tool. We already use AI to analyse Funding Service user feedback and triage needed system improvements, and we will build on this capability' joy
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Andrew MacAskill @macaskillaf.bsky.social · 10/07/2026
Congrats to @soyonhonglab.bsky.social and ger! Very happy to have played a small part in this!
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Andrew MacAskill @macaskillaf.bsky.social · 08/07/2026
A fantastic opportunity for a computational neuroscience lab. Come and join our amazing department! You’ll be surrounded by outstanding systems, cellular and molecular neuroscientists tackling fundamental questions about how the brain works. 🧠📈🧪
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UCL Neuroscience @uclnpp.bsky.social · 08/07/2026
Only two days left to apply to the best neuroscience department! #NeuroSkyence 🧠📈🧪 Computational neuroscience, systems, synapses and molecules, all under one roof. Come join an amazing collaborative group!
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Stéphanie C Koch @skochlab.bsky.social · 30/04/2026
Our paper is out! Work by Christopher Black in collaboration with Liam Browne, Rob Brownstone, and Marco Beato. Here, we describe the unique kinematic signatures of multi-limb coordination in freely climbing mice and show how these flexibly adapt to changing environments. tinyurl.com/4bnw88wk
tinyurl.com
Naturalistic climbing reveals adaptive strategies for interlimb coordination in freely moving mice
Multi-limb coordination is vital for mammalian locomotion. While coordination requires reliable organization of limb movements, it also requires flexibility to adapt to environmental demands. In natur...
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Andrew MacAskill @macaskillaf.bsky.social · 19/05/2026
vision to navigation via colliculus not V1! very cool stuff from @ruedigersarah.bsky.social in @uclnpp.bsky.social
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Prof Rick Adams @drrickadams.bsky.social · 18/05/2026
📢PhD job alert! A exciting PhD project that involves using MEG and biophysical modelling to try to predict effects of a glutamatergic treatment for psychosis... plus you can develop your own side project. Join our great team! www.ucl.ac.uk/work-at-ucl/...
ucl.ac.uk
UCL – University College London
UCL is consistently ranked as one of the top ten universities in the world (QS World University Rankings 2010-2022) and is No.2 in the UK for research power (Research Excellence Framework 2021).
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European Research Council (ERC) @erc.europa.eu · 29/04/2026
NEWS: The ERC Scientific Council has listened to the concerns from members of the research community about changes to the re-submission rules, intended to manage the surge in demand for grants. The Scientific Council will readjust some of the changes: link.europa.eu/TBqRQJ
link.europa.eu
ERC Scientific Council readjusts rules for reapplication
The ERC Scientific Council has listened to the concerns from members of the research community about the recent announcement on changes to the re-submission rules. The changes, intended to manage the ...
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Andrew MacAskill @macaskillaf.bsky.social · 26/04/2026
(and obvs the amazing howard eichenbaum, and too many other to name - apologies if your fave was missed)
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Andrew MacAskill @macaskillaf.bsky.social · 26/04/2026
Hopefully, with this task in hand, we may be in a better position to test these ideas directly, and perhaps prompt a few more arguments!
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Andrew MacAskill @macaskillaf.bsky.social · 26/04/2026
we were really motivated by the amazing arguments around the idea that the hippocampus might be a relational learning system - led by people like Rudy and Sutherland, and John Pearce - which was never really resolved, even though it has come back into favour more recently.
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Andrew MacAskill @macaskillaf.bsky.social · 26/04/2026
Huge congrats to @snierwetberg.bsky.social , David (not on BSky), and @maxwellxchen.bsky.social for their paper! They developed a mouse task in which relational structure can be isolated from cue identity and reward statistics. www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6... 🧠📈🧪 #neuroskyence @uclnpp.bsky.social
biorxiv.org
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Izumi Fukunaga @ifukunaga.bsky.social · 21/04/2026
We are recruiting a post-doc to study olfactory processing and decision-making in rodents, combining quantitative behavior with neurophysiology. www.oist.jp/careers/post... Please share with interested colleagues and trainees 🙏
oist.jp
Post-doctoral Researcher - Sensory and Behavioural Neuroscience Unit
Post-doctoral positions are available in the Sensory and Behavioural Neuroscience Unit (https://www.oist.jp/research/research-units/sbn) at Okinawa Institute of Science and Technology Graduate Univers...
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Dr Ino Agrafioti @inoagrafioti.bsky.social · 16/04/2026
I don’t know if you saw the MASSIVE news announced by @erc.europa.eu today: from now on, if you get a B at step 1 you are eligible to apply at N+3(!!!) years. Say you got a B in STG2026 step 1, you thought you could apply in STG2028, but no: only in STG2029! erc.europa.eu/news-events/...
erc.europa.eu
Applying for an ERC grant in the 2027 competitions: what you need to know
The ERC plans to launch the grant competitions under its 2027 Work Programme between July 2026 and June 2027, with the calls for proposals introducing several changes to the eligibility rules for appl...
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Athena Akrami @athenaakrami.bsky.social · 13/04/2026
New preprint! 🧠 How do RNNs learn abstract rules from sequences, independent of specific stimuli? By Vezha Boboeva, with Alberto Pezzotta & George Dimitriadis "From sequences to schemas: low-rank recurrent dynamics underlie abstract relational representations" www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...
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Selina Wray @selinawray.bsky.social · 13/04/2026
New preprint 🥳 Gamma secretase isnt a single enzyme, multiple GSEC exist depending on which subunits are incorporated into the complex. We made PSEN1 & PSEN2 knockouts to study the impact of different GSEC in neurons & microglia Led by @celarber.bsky.social www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...
biorxiv.org
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Brad Wyble @bwyble.bsky.social · 09/04/2026
Random neuroscience trainee tip: If you struggle to keep track of rostral vs caudal, remember that rostral rhymes with nostril.
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Jes Pass @jespass.bsky.social · 27/03/2026
Super excited to see the first paper from my PhD out! 🐭 Very satisfying to get to build an interpretable model of how the brain does a thing. A nice palette cleanser in the current sea of LLMs and deep ML.
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Andrew MacAskill @macaskillaf.bsky.social · 28/03/2026
Haha you are on bluesky!!!
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Dan Levenstein @dlevenstein.bsky.social · 25/03/2026
This is the most insider shade ever and I’m here for it. #wormFly4pres2026🪱🪰
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Andrew MacAskill @macaskillaf.bsky.social · 24/03/2026
The cool thing is she found that this works best by combining two signals: what we 'see' (features of the environment) and what 'happens' (outcomes of our actions). Together, these allow stable context inference and flexible behaviour even when information is weak or ambiguous!
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Andrew MacAskill @macaskillaf.bsky.social · 24/03/2026
She asked: how do we figure out what “situation” we’re in when it isn’t obvious? Answer: The brain has to infer hidden context from incomplete or noisy information — and use that to decide what to do next.
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Andrew MacAskill @macaskillaf.bsky.social · 24/03/2026
Huge congratulations to Jes (not on Bsky) for her paper in @plos.org Computational Biology! A really elegant modelling study on how the brain discovers hidden structure and uses it to guide behaviour. @uclnpp.bsky.social @ucllifesciences.bsky.social 🧪 📈 🧠 journals.plos.org/ploscompbiol...
journals.plos.org
Contextual inference through flexible integration of environmental features and behavioural outcomes
Author summary To behave flexibly, animals must determine which situation or context they are in, even when the information that defines that context is incomplete or no longer visible. This problem, ...
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Helen Barron @helencbarron.bsky.social · 20/03/2026
*** New paper from the lab in Nature Comms !! *** “Noradrenaline causes a spread of association in the hippocampal cognitive map” by the amazing @reneecabbage.bsky.social in collab. w labs of Jill O’Reilly, Will Clarke, and modeling from Prakriti Parthasarathy and @tpvogels.bsky.social, see below!
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Andrew MacAskill @macaskillaf.bsky.social · 14/03/2026
Big changes - wording is a bit ambiguous as to whether these will be peer reviewed..? Hopefully! - experimental medicine and discovery science considered together and funded from the same 'bucket' is a touch scary for the discovery types!
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Andrew MacAskill @macaskillaf.bsky.social · 13/03/2026
#neuroskyence 🧠 🧪 📈
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Andrew MacAskill @macaskillaf.bsky.social · 13/03/2026
Early life isolation reduces excitability in the vH→PFC pathway and disrupts dimension-based learning. A hierarchical reinforcement learning model captures these behavioural differences, and a human analogue of the task shows comparable effects. Come by and chat!
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Andrew MacAskill @macaskillaf.bsky.social · 13/03/2026
We use a tweaked version of the mouse attentional set-shifting task that highlights dimension learning and generalisation. Mice learn which abstract stimulus dimension (odours/textures) predicts reward across multiple exemplars, and we probe this by asking how they adapt when the dimension changes.
cartoon of a mouse choosing different options
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Andrew MacAskill @macaskillaf.bsky.social · 13/03/2026
Another poster today at #cosyne26 (2-112)! @rowanboard shows how early life social isolation alters dimension-based learning, cognitive flexibility, and the ventral hippocampus–PFC circuit. Great collaboration with @jonroiser.bsky.social linking mouse and human versions of the task!
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Anton Strezhnev @astrezh.bsky.social · 12/03/2026
Can this be a solution?
Fitzcarraldo
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Andrew MacAskill @macaskillaf.bsky.social · 12/03/2026
Even though transition statistics are flat, hippocampal population activity reflects the underlying community structure, and this representation emerges over learning. Come by the poster if you’re interested in structure learning, hippocampus, or latent state representations! #neuroskyence 🧪 🧠 📈
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Andrew MacAskill @macaskillaf.bsky.social · 12/03/2026
The poster builds on the temporal community structure paradigm originally introduced by @annaschapiro.bsky.social We adapted it to a 15-odour odour graph to ask whether mice learn the latent community structure, and how hippocampal activity reflects that organisation.
community graph structure
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Andrew MacAskill @macaskillaf.bsky.social · 12/03/2026
Poster tonight at #cosyne26 (1-079)! @wanqingjiang.bsky.social & @noehamou.bsky.social show that mice learn hidden community structure in a 15-odour graph even when transition statistics are flat. Fun collaboration with @saxelab.bsky.social that started with East London coffees ☕!
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Andrew MacAskill @macaskillaf.bsky.social · 07/03/2026
Yep I have increasingly been using text to speech apps and listening to my writing on the commute - amazingly effective at catching my drivel!
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Andrew MacAskill @macaskillaf.bsky.social · 04/03/2026
Super cool paper on human hippocampus in a non spatial planning task - congrats!
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