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The big brains
October 2011
EDIT CONNECT
SHARING OPTIONS:
WASHINGTON,
D.C.—Billed as "the world's largest forum for neuroscientists to
debut research and network with colleagues from around the
world,"
the 41st
annual meeting of the Society for
Neuroscience (SfN)—otherwise
known as Neuroscience 2011—will take place Nov. 12 to 16 in
Washington, D.C., at the Walter E. Washington Convention Center.
With
an expected
attendance of more than 31,000 people, SfN will keep
everyone engaged and interactive through lectures, symposia,
workshops and social events focused
on innovative neuroscience
research. The meeting also will feature thousands of abstracts and
provide networking and professional development
opportunities.
If
figuring out what to attend and when to do it is a bit of a
challenge—and it probably is for
most people—the meeting section
of the SfN website, located at
www.sfn.org/am2011/, features the
Neuroscience Meeting Planner (NMP). The NMP can be used not only to
search abstracts and sessions, but
also to create your own itinerary
for the annual meeting.
To
head off other potential complications for attendees,
SfN has also
contracted with KiddieCorp to provide childcare
and youth programs
for those attending the meeting with their families in tow. Onsite
childcare and youth programs are available for children between
the
ages of 6 months and 12 years, but spaces are limited, and it's
possible if you haven't already reserved a spot, there may not be
any more
left. KiddieCorp can be reached by phone at (858) 455-1718
or by email at info@kiddiecorp.com, and its website is at
http://www.kiddiecorp.com/.
KiddieCorp
is in its 25th
year of providing such services at conventions, trade shows and
special events,
with the goal of providing children "with a program
they want to attend, while providing you with that critical 'peace
of mind' so you can attend
sessions," according to the company.
This year's theme is "Science Camp" and activities will include
arts and crafts projects each day, group
games, music and movement,
board games, story time and dramatic play.
NeuroJobs
Job Fair
New
at this year's meeting will be SfN's first NeuroJobs
Job Fair,
featuring employers from industry, nonprofit organizations and
academia on-site, along with concurrent career development workshops.
The
event is free for all meeting attendees and is, as SfN notes, "an
opportunity for employers to meet hundreds of job seekers at
Neuroscience 2011."
The NeuroJobs Job Fair will be held Saturday,
Nov. 12, from 8:30 a.m. to 11 a.m., and from 1 p.m. to 4 p.m.,
closing at midday for the Neuroscience
2011's "Dialogues"
lecture.
Speaking
of that lecture, the speaker will be Dr. Robert J. Shiller, an
American
economist, academic and bestselling author, who will talk
about economics and behavior under the title of "Animal Spirits:
How Human Behavior Drives
the Economy." Shiller currently serves as
the Arthur M. Okun Professor of Economics at Yale University and is a
fellow at the Yale International Center for Finance of the Yale
School of Management.
Reportedly
ranked among the 100 most influential economists of the world,
Shiller's work has addressed how psychological
factors influence
decision-making in the economic arena and the impact of group
dynamics on financial markets, and SfN invites you to "join Dr.
Shiller and leading neuroscientists for an exciting opportunity to
examine the interplay between economics and the brain."
Presidential
Special Lectures
Neurotrophins:
From Axon Growth to Synaptic Plasticity
Mu-Ming
Poo, Ph.D.
University
of California, Berkeley and Institute of Neuroscience, Chinese
Academy of Sciences
Saturday,
Nov. 12, 5:15 p.m. to 6:25
p.m.
Neurotrophins
were first identified as target-derived factors that promote neuronal
differentiation and survival. Over the past
decades, they also were
found to regulate neuronal differentiation, axonal and dendritic
growth, synapse formation and plasticity, as well as cognition
and
behavior. This lecture provides a retrospective view of the evolving
concepts in the study of neurotrophins, with some highlights on
recent
findings on the role of neurotrophins in axon development and
synaptic plasticity.
The
Basal Ganglia:
Binding Values to Action
Ann
M. Graybiel, Ph.D.
Massachusetts
Institute of Technology
Sunday,
Nov. 13, 5:15 p.m. to 6:25 p.m.
This
lecture will summarize evidence that neural activity in cortico-basal
ganglia circuits can exhibit high levels of flexibility related to
value-based decision-making and adaptive behavior, but also can
become overly
fixed despite the need for change. This interplay
between flexibility and fixity, if imbalanced, may underlie
dysfunctions leading to motor and
neuropsychiatric problems in basal
ganglia-based disorders.
Genes,
the Environment, and Decisions: How
Fixed Circuits Generate Flexible
Behaviors
Cornelia
I. Bargmann, Ph.D.
Rockefeller
University
Monday,
Nov. 14, 5:15 p.m. to 6:25 p.m.
How
do genes and the environment interact to generate
flexible behaviors?
How are behavioral decisions modified by context and experience?
Genetic variation, internal states and environmental conditions
converge on common neuronal circuits to regulate behaviors in the
nematode worm C.
elegans. Analysis of
these circuits shows the detailed
wiring diagram of C.
elegans is both
incomplete and ambiguous, because modulatory inputs invisible in the
anatomical wiring change the flow
of information.
The
Epigenetic Basis of Common Human Disease
Andrew
P. Feinberg,
M.D., MPH
Johns
Hopkins University School of Medicine
Tuesday,
Nov. 15, 5:15 p.m. to 6:25 p.m.
Epigenetics
is the study of heritable information other than the sequence of DNA.
We are taking an integrated approach to catalyze the generalization
of gene-
specific to genomic epigenetics and to advance the focus from
cancer to common disease. Doing this requires an integration of new
conceptual,
technological, epidemiological and statistical
approaches. Epigenetic variation influenced by genetic variants could
help mediate complex traits. We
have identified sites of stochastic
epigenetic variation in the genome that are stably linked to traits
such as body mass index.
Improved
member directory launched this spring
WASHINGTON,
D.C.—April saw the Society for Neuroscience (SfN) launch a new
"Enhanced Member Directory" (EMD) to give its members "a
great
new resource for finding colleagues around the world." The EMD is
accessible only to fellow SfN members, the society notes, "so you
can
share your fields of study, contact information and biographical
information within a trusted community." According to SfN,
populating the EMD was the
first step toward the launch of
NeurOnLine, SfN's members-only online community that launched in the
summer. Designed to engage members at all career
levels, NeurOnLine
"will keep you plugged in to the global SfN membership community,"
the organization maintains.
NeuroJobs
gets a facelift
WASHINGTON,
D.C.—Early July saw SfN change up the technology
platform for the
NeuroJobs online professional development offering, giving it what
the organization calls "a new look and enhanced features to help
you find jobs even faster. New features include: advanced search
options with "cloud filters," an intuitive and visual way to sort
and customize
your job search results; saved job searches; enhanced
job alerts, allowing users to establish a search and receive an
automatic notification whenever a
matching job is posted; Google
Maps, so that job-seekers can now assess potential commutes right
from the job detail screen; social media integration
to more easily
access NeuroJobs on Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn and to post and
find positions using all three networking sites; job application
previews; and a searchable portfolio.
Online
funding directory available
WASHINGTON,
D.C.—A new online offering appeared in mid-August courtesy of SfN,
called the "SfN Directory of International Sources of
Neuroscience
Funding." This resource is for members seeking information about
international sources of funding for neuroscience. The online
directory provides information about agencies, programs and
opportunities for research grants, fellowships and other types of
funding available by
region and country. SfN will continue to update
the directory as it learns about new opportunities, and SfN members
are encouraged to submit updates
and information about additional
resources to globalaffairs@sfn.org.
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