ECE Faculty Candidate Seminar
Dr. Christopher Langdon
Postdoctoral Researcher, Princeton Neuroscience Institute
Thursday, February 8, 2024, 10:00-11:00 am
1000 HMNTL Seminar Room or via Zoom
Title: Reverse engineering neural circuits for goal directed behavior
Abstract: Animals have the ability to flexibly construct and pursue abstract goals depending on context. Reverse engineering the biological neural circuits underlying this ability is a central aim of neuroscience. Continuing advances in our ability to record and manipulate large-scale neural circuits during complex behavior is bringing this aim within reach. However, fully leveraging these technological advances requires parallel advances in our theoretical understanding of computation in large neural circuits as well as in our ability to generate realistically testable predictions from theory.
As an example of a state-of-the-art large scale neural recording dataset, I will first present our results from brain-wide single-cell neural recordings in mice, revealing how behaviorally relevant variables are represented across cortical and subcortical regions. I will then present theoretical work characterizing behaviorally relevant computations and dynamics in artificial recurrent neural circuits. As an application of this theory, I will show what it reveals about the representation of irrelevant stimuli in prefrontal cortex during goal directed behavior, using neural recording data from primates. These results demonstrate how artificial neural networks can be used to understand the biological neural circuit mechanisms underlying context-dependent behavior. Looking forward, I will discuss how reverse engineering artificial neural network models of more complex and naturalistic tasks will yield insight into the multi-area neural computations underlying goal directed behavior.
Chris Langdon is a postdoc at the Princeton Neuroscience Institute and a member of the International Brain Laboratory. His research focuses on computation in both artificial and biological neural circuits. He received his Ph.D. in mathematics from the University of Miami in 2017 and worked as a postdoc in mathematical neuroscience at Pennsylvania State University from 2017-2019.
