Monthly Archives: June 2019

UMass Neurosciences Publications – June 2019

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This month’s featured Researcher is Luke Remage-Healey. He recently received a renewal of $1.7 million grant from NIH to investigate fundamental mechanisms of how the bird brain learns and processes complex stimuli like song.  In general, his lab studies how neural circuits for vocal communication are modulated by the actions of local neurochemicals. For example, changing levels of brain estrogens can alter the pattern or ‘tone’ of neural circuit activity, enabling many flexible outputs from the same circuit. They think this modulation allows interconnected forebrain circuits to subserve a wide variety of complex behaviors, like singing, song learning, and song memory. Luke and his student Daniel Vahaba published a paper in the journal Hormones and Behavior that appeared this month in PubMed.

Here’s what else is new for ‘ ”University of Massachusetts” AND Amherst AND neuroscience’ in PubMed. These publications appeared on line in June. They are just a fraction of the research that occurs on campus. Continue reading →

IONs Director’s Channel – June 2019

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Barto award

UMass Neurosciences Lifetime Achievement Award presented to Andy Barto by Neurosciences Director Paul Katz and Chancellor Kumble Subbaswamy

May was an exciting time for the Neurosciences at UMass and more is planned for the summer like the inaugural Neuroscience Summer Seminar Series.
The Interdisciplinary Neurosciences Conference was a great success and started a conversation on campus between the neurosciences and engineering. The Workshop on Methods in Systems Neuroscience and Neurotechnology,  laid out some of the newest techniques for understanding complex brain circuitry. Andy Barto was awarded a UMass Neurosciences Lifetime Achievement Award by Chancellor Subbaswamy. Tributes to Andy poured in from leaders in the fields of Machine Learning and Reinforcement learning.  Here is just a small sample.  Continue reading →

Neuroscience Summer Seminar Series

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This summer, we will have our inaugural Neurosciences Summer Seminar Series featuring UMass faculty and post-docs. This is a great opportunity to learn more about the work going on here at UMass. Seminars will be at noon in 423 Tobin Hall. Bring your lunch! Hang out afterward and talk to the speaker.

Line up of speakers:

 

UMass Neurosciences Publications – May 2019

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This month’s featured researcher is Margaret Stratton.  Meg is an assistant professor in Biochemistry and Molecular Biology at UMass. Her research focuses on  understanding the molecular components of memory. In particular, she works on a protein called calcium-calmodulin dependent protein kinase II or CaMKII. molecule is actually a complex of twelve subunits that provide it with unique properties that allow it to alter neuronal activity. In recent paper published in the journal Neuron, Meg and her collaborators demonstrated a novel mechanism that allows CamKII to have persistent effects.

Here’s what’ new for ‘ ”University of Massachusetts” AND Amherst AND neuroscience’ in PubMed. These publications appeared on line in May. They are just a fraction of the research that occurs on campus. Continue reading →