Banerjee group | Adaptive Decisions Lab
- +44 1865 271941
- abhishek.banerjee@pharm.ox.ac.uk
- http://www.adaptive-decisions.com
The research in the Adaptive Decisions Lab is focused on understanding the dynamics of micro and mesoscopic circuits, with the primary goal to elucidate how dysfunction in mechanisms at either spatial scale leads to pathophysiology in autism spectrum disorders. We achieve this by combining rodent behavioural tasks with novel mesoscopic and 2-photon calcium imaging, optogenetics, and region-specific CRISPR-Cas9 editing of disease-related genes.
Research: Adaptive Learning in the Brain
How do we learn new tasks in our everyday life? If you know how to play tennis, what happens when you move to Oxford and start playing, say, squash for the first time? How does our brain understand and accommodate new sensorimotor actions (e.g., serve) as well as new ‘rules of the game’ (e.g., strategies to win a point)? Understanding how the brain learns a new cognitive task that allows our behaviour to be flexible is a profoundly intricate challenge. This is partly due to decentralised neural computation in the brain. Learning dynamics shape the properties of microscopic structures in individual neurons and how populations of similar or different types of neurons in different brain areas interact at the mesoscale to influence new learning and decision-making. We are captivated by the complexity of such questions.
The research in our Adaptive Decisions Lab entails a combination of parametric behavioural tasks, novel neurotechnology (viral methods, optogenetics, CRISPR-Cas9), and multi-area imaging methods to reveal the dynamics of micro-and mesoscopic circuits during flexible behaviour. This effort promises substantial new insight into how dysfunction in mechanisms at either spatial scale leads to pathophysiology in autism spectrum disorders. We also merge the field of AI and neuroscience to implement new machine learning algorithms to decipher and better interpret how cognitive variables reorganise during learning. Finally, we are developing analogous cognitive tasks in humans with EEG and fMRI measurements to probe conserved circuit-specific computations in the brain. Our work is at the forefront of dimensional psychiatry, offering a promising cross-species neurobiological and computational footing to understand brain disorders.
Our team
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Abhishek Banerjee
Professor of Neuroscience at Queen Mary University, London and Wellcome Trust Career Development Fellow at University of Oxford
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Maria-Miruna Costreie
Postdoctoral Research Associate in Neural Circuits and Behaviour
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Marie Habart
Post-doctoral fellow
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Agata Stramek
Laboratory Manager
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Klara Hatinova
Visting PhD student, Queen Mary University London
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Rohan Rao
Visting PhD student, Newcastle University
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Jasper Teutsch
Visiting PhD student, University of Newcastle
Collaborators:
Flexible decision-making in humans (Dr Burkhard Pleger, Ruhr University, Bochum, Germany)
Emerging algorithms in reinforcement learning (Prof. Walter Senn, Universität Bern, Switzerland)
Bayesian models of behaviour (Prof. Mark Humphries, University of Nottingham, UK)
Reinforcement learning models of behaviour (Prof. Chris Summerfield, University of Oxford, UK)
Neuromorphic engineering and machine learning (Dr Mattia Rigotti, IBM, Switzerland)