2018-19 Department of Psychology Colloquium Series and the Jefferson Scholars Foundation Neuroscience Professorship-- David Fitzpatrick (Max Planck Florida Institute)

The pioneering work of Hubel and Wiesel defined the fundamental challenge in understanding the functional organization of visual cortex: How do cortical circuits transform the information supplied by different populations of retinal ganglion cells into coherent representations of the visual world? Their demonstration of emergent properties of cortical circuits such as selectivity for the orientation of edges, and an orderly columnar architecture for orientation preference set the stage for a host of studies that have addressed the circuit mechanisms responsible for this transform. While progress has been substantial, the fine scale functional synaptic architecture that allows individual neurons to integrate inputs from diverse sources to produce coherent sensory representations remains largely unknown. This presentation will focus on recent studies employing a combination of in vivo imaging and stimulation techniques with cellular and synaptic resolution that provide new insights into the role that functional specificity in synaptic connections and dendritic topology play in shaping the cortical transform.

Time and Location: 
3:30pm, Gilmer 190
Date: 
Friday, March 29, 2019
Subtitle: 
Functional Synaptic Architecture of Neocortex: From Clusters to Columns