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Marino Pagan @marinopagan.bsky.social · 19/05/2025

My small tribute to one of my favourite papers ever

Marino Pagan @marinopagan.bsky.social · 19/05/2025

No worries at all! I appreciate the additional context, and I agree it's very valuable for readers who might be unfamiliar with the literature. I am glad we had a chance to further clarify things 😀

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Marino Pagan @marinopagan.bsky.social · 17/05/2025

(3/3) When I talk about RNNs, the key innovation is the use of methods to find the network's fixed points and study the linearized dynamics, like in Sussillo & Barak, 2013. Also, I agree that others had already trained monkeys to do similar tasks, but the analyses are what made the difference here!

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Marino Pagan @marinopagan.bsky.social · 17/05/2025

(2/3) In my opinion, this is different from using unsupervised methods like PCA (or even more refined methods like demixed PCA) and is more similar e.g. to the ideas of "potent" and "null" axes like in Kaufman et al., 2014.

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Marino Pagan @marinopagan.bsky.social · 17/05/2025

(1/3) Hi @jbarbosa.org! The transmitter piece was meant for a broad audience so it was hard to describe in too much detail the novel aspects of Mante & Sussillo. When I talk about population dynamics, I refer to their use of targeted dimensionality reduction to find key axes in neural space.

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Carlos Brody @carlosbrody.bsky.social · 08/05/2025

we're crowd-sourcing a searchable repository of tangible benefits stemming from federally-funded research. Come enjoy the great stories; or send in an idea; or volunteer to join the team. publicusaresearchbenefits.com please share and re-share so we get more great stories in there!

publicusaresearchbenefits.com

Searchable database of tangible benefits that federally-funded research gave us.

A crowd-sourced site. Health and Well-being. National Security. Prosperity.

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Marino Pagan @marinopagan.bsky.social · 07/04/2025

🚨 Deadline extended! 🚨 A few more days to apply for this PhD project in my lab - come to Edinburgh and study flexible decision-making with us! Please share if you know someone who might be interested 🙂

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Marino Pagan @marinopagan.bsky.social · 28/03/2025

We are hiring a PhD student to study the neural mechanisms underlying flexible decision-making and individual variability. Please apply and spread the word!

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Marino Pagan @marinopagan.bsky.social · 25/03/2025

Haha I wish we could work something out! Thank you for the nice words! 😀

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Marino Pagan @marinopagan.bsky.social · 24/03/2025

I am hiring a PhD student in my lab in beautiful Edinburgh to keep investigating the neural mechanisms underlying flexible decision-making and individual variability. Email or DM me with any questions, or let's chat at the CoSyNe Main Meeting next week! Apply here: tinyurl.com/2cxr6nbg

tinyurl.com

Study of the neural mechanisms underlying flexible decision-making at University of Edinburgh on FindAPhD.com

PhD Project - Study of the neural mechanisms underlying flexible decision-making at University of Edinburgh, listed on FindAPhD.com

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Marino Pagan @marinopagan.bsky.social · 21/03/2025

7/7 Finally, we will be presenting a poster at @cosynemeeting.bsky.social in Montreal next week (Poster 1-061). I look forward to chatting about all this, and to present some new results about how rats and RNNs learn to solve flexible decision-making. Please come say hi! 😀

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Marino Pagan @marinopagan.bsky.social · 21/03/2025

6/7 In my lab @sidb-edinburgh.bsky.social in Edinburgh, we study the neural mechanisms underlying flexible decision-making, and we leverage rat models of neurodevelopmental disorders to study the link between genetic mutations and cognitive dysfunction. We are hiring! www.marinopagan.com/pagan_lab

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Marino Pagan @marinopagan.bsky.social · 21/03/2025

5/7 What’s next? Using rats opens the door to the use of modern genetic and molecular tools available in rodents to study context-dependent evidence accumulation. It also offers an unique opportunity to study how genetic mutations can affect the neural circuits underlying flexible decision-making.

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Marino Pagan @marinopagan.bsky.social · 21/03/2025

4/7 Infinite thanks to my wonderful postdoctoral Mentor, Carlos Brody, who was an inexhaustible source of guidance, wisdom and support! 🙏🙏🙏 Also very grateful to our fantastic collaborators, @sussillodavid.bsky.social , Valerio Mante, Mikio Aoi, @jpillowtime.bsky.social , and Vincent Tang.

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Marino Pagan @marinopagan.bsky.social · 21/03/2025

3/7 Also, we found that recurrent neural networks (RNNs) can fail to capture the heterogeneity observed in biological brains. We introduce new methods to design RNNs that cover the full space of solutions, bridging the gap between artificial systems and the diversity seen in biological computation.

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Marino Pagan @marinopagan.bsky.social · 21/03/2025

2/7 Most neuroscience research focuses on what is common across subjects, but individual differences can be large for tasks that allow many different internal solutions! Our work highlights the importance of characterizing individual variability when studying complex cognitive behaviours.

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Marino Pagan @marinopagan.bsky.social · 21/03/2025

1/7 Our paper on individual variability in decision-making is finally out in @nature.com! Inspired by the classic work by Mante and Sussillo, we trained many rats to solve context-dependent decision-making, and we found that different brains use different neural mechanisms to solve the same task!

nature.com

Individual variability of neural computations underlying flexible decisions - Nature

Behavioural experiments to study decision-making in response to context-dependent accumulation of evidence provide testable models that are consistent with the heterogeneity in neural signatures among...

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Princeton Neuroscience Institute @princetonneuro.bsky.social · 21/01/2025

A surprising variability in how rats process sounds, evaluate evidence, and make choices underscores the complexity of the brain’s decision-making process, finds a new study in @nature.com from the labs of PNI's Carlos Brody and @jpillowtime.bsky.social. pni.princeton.edu/news/2025/ne...

pni.princeton.edu

A new “hearing test” for rats reveals the brain’s hidden variability when making a decision

Simple choices can arise from diverse brain strategies, shedding light on the origins of individual variability

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Simons Initiative for the Developing Brain (SIDB) @sidb-edinburgh.bsky.social · 16/01/2025

We are pleased to be partnering with The UKRI AI CDT in Biomedical Innovation at the School of Informatics (University of Edinburgh). These PhD projects have a strong translational focus and seek to develop & apply AI approaches to biomedical domains ✨. Apply by 20 Jan www.ai4biomed.io/how-to-apply/

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Paul Donlin-Asp @pdaphd.bsky.social · 09/01/2025

Thanks to our recent Wellcome funding- we're hiring a Postdoctoral Researcher to explore the mechanisms underlying synaptic RNA capture and selective local protein synthesis. This position has 5 years of funding. Please reach out if you have any questions! elxw.fa.em3.oraclecloud.com/hcmUI/Candid...

elxw.fa.em3.oraclecloud.com

Postdoctoral Research Fellow

We seek a motivated postdoctoral researcher to conduct primary research into how neurons transport mRNA to distal sites and use these mRNAs as substrates for local protein synthesis during synaptic pl...

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Reposted by Marino Pagan

Simons Initiative for the Developing Brain (SIDB) @sidb-edinburgh.bsky.social · 14/01/2025

There’s just under 2 weeks to apply for our PhD studentships! Join our dynamic community where we provide an annual stipend of £25K, plus tuition fees (inc. international) 🧠. Apply by 26 January and start your journey with us: sidb.org.uk/phds/ @edinburghmedschool.bsky.social

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Marino Pagan @marinopagan.bsky.social · 12/12/2024

Completely agree! As we showed in our 2023 arXiv paper, the non-linear & linearized dynamics resulting from the two equations are exactly the same. However, some downstream analyses can produce different results! E.g. context-dependent input modulation can only be seen using one of the two equations

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Marino Pagan @marinopagan.bsky.social · 01/12/2024

Can I be added as well? Thank you very much!

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Marino Pagan @marinopagan.bsky.social · 01/12/2024

I think Marr levels are a great framework to study mental disorders:1) what computations are altered? 2) What neural mechanisms (at Systems level) cause these altered computations? 3) What are the underlying cellular/molecular changes? We know a lot about 3), little about 1), almost nothing about 2)

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Marino Pagan @marinopagan.bsky.social · 01/12/2024

Thanks! Waiting for the copy-edited version to announce it in a proper Bluesky-tweetprint 😀

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Marino Pagan @marinopagan.bsky.social · 01/12/2024

I can think of so many counter examples!

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Marino Pagan @marinopagan.bsky.social · 01/12/2024

I would argue they are still quite useful! E.g. ring attractors as the "algorithm" to maintain head direction, yet the "implementation" is very different in drosophila vs rodents. Or the whole "computation through dynamics" paradigm working in RNNs and brains despite very different neural substrates

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Marino Pagan @marinopagan.bsky.social · 29/11/2024

Not sure about full standardization, but measures of cognitive function (IQ, intellectual disability) often conflate many distinct cognitive skills (working memory, inhibitory control, cognitive flexibility etc). Approaches from systems neuroscience would help isolate individual cognitive functions

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Simons Initiative for the Developing Brain (SIDB) @sidb-edinburgh.bsky.social · 20/11/2024

SIDB has partnered with The UKRI AI CDT in Biomedical Innovation. Our PhD studentships have a strong translational focus and seek to develop & apply AI approaches to biomedical domains. Find out more & apply by 20th Jan >> www.ai4biomed.io/research/pro... @tisimpson.bsky.social

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Marino Pagan @marinopagan.bsky.social · 24/11/2024

Project 2 👥 How do humans learn to form flexible decisions? We bridge insights between rodent and human cognition using recurrent neural networks! tinyurl.com/24fyyxh6 “Investigating cognitive flexibility and rule learning using an online videogame and computational modelling” Deadline: Jan. 20

tinyurl.com

Projects for 2025 entry – UKRI AI CDT in Biomedical Innovation

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Marino Pagan @marinopagan.bsky.social · 24/11/2024

Project 1 🐀 What neural mechanisms support flexible decision-making, how do they vary across individual subjects, and how are they altered in neurodevelopmental disorders? We combine sophisticated rat behavior, ephys, optogenetics and computational techniques! tinyurl.com/278ga26r Deadline: Jan. 25

tinyurl.com

SIDB

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Marino Pagan @marinopagan.bsky.social · 24/11/2024

🚨 PhD opportunity alert! 🚨 Join our lab @sidb-edinburgh.bsky.social in beautiful Edinburgh! We study the neural mechanisms underlying flexible decision-making using cutting-edge experimental and computational approaches. We’re recruiting for two fully funded PhD positions. Details below 👇

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