SPP 2205
Evolutionary optimization of neuronal processing

Convergence, divergence, and computational optimization in neural circuit evolution

program

June 23, 2024


15:00-15:15 welcome and opening remarks

15:15-16:00 Lecture I: On dogs, dinosaurs, and diversity: From an optimization-minded to an opportunity-based view of brain evolution (Suzana Herculano-Houzel, Vanderbilt University, Nashville, USA)

Session I: Neural circuit evolution across deep time


  • 16:00-16:30 From so simple a beginning, or why study opossum brains? (Diego Astúa, Universidade Federal de Pernambuco - UFPE, Recife, Brazil)
  • 16:30-17:00 Functional organisation of visual processing in the avian brain (Winston Seah, Ruhr University Bochum, Germany)
  • 17:00-17:45 Lecture II: Composition and characteristics of cnidarian nervous systems (Ulrich Technau, University of Vienna, Austria)




June 24, 2024


09:00-09:15 opening remarks

09:15-10:00 Key note: Natural Neuroscience (Nachum Ulanovsky, Weizmann Institute of Science, Rehovot, Israel)

Session II: Grade shifts in the evolution of cortical networks

  • 10:00-10:30 Functional circuitry of visual cortex in a very large rodent brain (Kerstin Schmidt, Brain Institute, Federal University of Rio Grande do Norte, Natal, Brazil)

    • 10:30-11:00 coffee break

    • 11:00-11:30 Optimization and phase transitions in visual cortex evolution (Zoe Stawyskyj, U Göttingen & Max Planck Institute for Dynamics and Self-Organization, Germany)
    • 11:30-12:00 Putting primates in perspective: size and shape in euarchontogliran brain evolution (Mary T. Silcox, University of Toronto, Scarborough, Canada )

      • 12:00-13:00 lunch break

      Session III: Molecular evolution of cellular processing
      13:00-13:45 Lecture III: Epistasis and the speed of evolution (Fyodor Kondrashov, Okinawa Institute of Science and Technology, Japan)

      Session VI: Early-branching nervous systems

      • 13:45-14:15 How animals decode time information from sun and moon (Kristin Tessmar-Raible, University of Vienna, Austria)
      • 14:15-14:45 Evolutionary and numerical optimization of biochemical networks (Gasper Tkacik, Institute of Science and Technology Austria, Klosterneuburg, Austria)



      15:00-17:00 poster session including coffee break

      17:00-17:45 Lecture IV: The dynamics of neocortical expansion in modern and archaic mammals (Ornella Bertrand, Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona, Spain)
      17:45-18:00 closing remarks