What's going on in the lab?
April 2024
We are excited to welcome a new postdoc, Kelton Wilmerding. Kelton earned his Ph.D. in Neuroscience from Boston University where he studied the neural correlates of artificial memory reactivation with Michael Hasselmo and Steve Ramirez. He has an enduring interest in how changes to the brain at the cellular and network level enable us to recall our most cherished experiences. Outside of lab he is a huge nerd, pet lover with three cats, and hiking enthusiast.
The first paper from the lab was published in PNAS this month. It is a collaboration at the interface of neuroscience and neuromorphic computing between the Milstein, Ramanathan, and the Grienberger labs. Check it out here and any and all feedback is welcome: https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.2318362121
March 2024
Christine presented at the Cosyne Workshops in Cascais, Portugal. One of the workshops, "What are the learning rules of the brain", organized by Timothy O'Leary, Cian O'Donnell, and Oleg Senkevich, is available on YouTube, so check it out! Any feedback is welcome. https://youtu.be/9_JBETMQwx8?si=YUj10yoRs6KxruU_ [youtu.be] (video credit to Oleg)
October 2023
It is finally official. We have won the NIH New Innovator Award (DP2). The grant will support research on the entorhinal cortex and its interaction with the hippocampus to drive learning and memory formation. We are incredibly grateful to the NIH for support of our research. Congrats to all the other winners!
September 2023
Thomas, a Neuro Master's student with a Physics background, joins the lab. Thomas will work on our calcium imaging analysis pipeline.
The semester starts. Welcome to rotation Fox Gourianova, first-year Neurosciencegraduate student.
August 2023
Brian decides to join the lab to work on a joint project with the Paradis lab.
Gabe presented his summer research during Brandeis' SciFest 2023 last week. Congratulations, Gabe and his mentor Mike. And thanks a lot to the Division of Science for supporting Gabe's work!
Photo credit: Tiffany Wong
July 2023
Christine becomes a Pew Scholar in the Biomedical Sciences. Thanks a lot to the Pew Charitable Trust for supporting our work.
Welcome to rotation student Brian Zhang! Brian will learn how to do two-photon Ca2+ imaging.
June 2023
Christine was again an instructor in the Cold Spring Harbor Ion Channel course. Mike joined as a Teaching Assistant for three weeks. He did a fantastic job teaching how to do in vivo whole-cell recordings to the fantastic graduate students and postdssc who attended the course.
Mai 2023
Mike passes his Inside exam. Congratulations, Mike Vivian, now officially Ph.D. candidate!
We are recruiting a postdoc to work on a collaborative project with the Paradis lab at Brandeis University starting September 2023 (but the start date is flexible). The project aims to uncover the molecular mechanisms of synaptic plasticity and its impact on learning and memory formation. This is an ideal position for someone with systems neuroscience training who wishes to learn molecular and cellular neuroscience, or vice versa. If you are interested to learn more, please get in touch via email.
March 2023
We welcome Vincent Chen. Vincent is a first-year Neuroscience graduate student and is doing a rotation in the lab.
Gabe wins an undergraduate summer fellowship from the Division of Science. Congratulations, and we look forward to having you over the summer to do some exciting science.
February 2023
Christine wins a Sloan Research Fellowship. We are deeply grateful to the Sloan Foundation for its support. Early career support like this makes a huge difference for our work.
January 2023
Happy New Year!
We welcome Connor Johnson. Connor is a first-year Neuroscience graduate student and is doing a rotation in the lab.
Also, a heartfelt welcome to Lisandro Martin, a new graduate student. Lisandro will work on the circuit mechanisms underlying behavioral timescale synaptic plasticity.
December 2022
A lot is going on. Brandeis Magazine published a story about the memory research happening at Brandeis, including some of ours. Here is the link: https://www.brandeis.edu/magazine/2023/winter/featured-stories/memory.html
The application for the Cold Spring Harbor Ion Channel in Synaptic and Neural Circuit Physiology is now open. Christine will be an instructor again. Email her with any questions.
Fantastic news to close the year. Christine's Cosyne workshop, submitted together with Aaron Milstein (Rutgers) and Richard Naud (University of Ottawa), has been accepted. The Cosyne meeting will happen in early March 2023 in Montreal (workshop in Mont Tremblant) and sits at the interface of systems and computational neuroscience. Our workshop will be on "Making plasticity work: biologically plausible rules for learning and credit assignment." If you are interested, join us and/or email Christine with any questions.
November 2022
Some of us celebrated the 30th anniversary of the Smith Family Awards Program for Excellence in Biomedical Research in the fancy Harvard Club of Boston. We appreciate the Smith Family Foundation taking a chance on a new lab and research program.
Christine's last postdoc paper is now published in Nature. Check it out, give me your feedback, and, most importantly, tweet about it.
Christine was interviewed for a technology feature on Patch-Seq by Vivien Marx (now published in Nature Methods). Have a look!
We also welcome this year's second rotation student, Michael Satchell. Michael has a background in physics and computational neuroscience and will use the next two months to learn how to do two-photon imaging.
September 2022
A second grant for the lab from the Air Force Office of Scientific Research. We will pursue work at the intersection of neuromorphic computing and neuroscience. And the lab's Inscopix miniscope has arrived. It will allow us to extend our work toward studies in freely-moving animals.
The first publication from the lab has been published! It is a Nature Reviews Methods Primer on everything you need to know about two-photon calcium imaging. Email Christine for the pdf!
We also welcome this year's first rotation student, Natalie d'Ambra. Natalie will learn how to do two-photon imaging.
August 2022
The team is growing! Welcome to Brandeis Undergraduates Zachary Fournier and Gabriel Haithcock. They will become first-class animal whisperers. We also welcome Ruixue Gao (Brandeis Master's student). She will work on identifying projections of the hippocampal formation to the rest of the brain.
Christine is starting teaching. NBIO240 "Principles of Neuroscience Research" will be a lot of fun and a lot of work. Hodgkin-Huxley papers, here I come!
June 2022
Christine and Aanchal had fun teaching in vivo whole-cell recordings and all things electrophysiology at the Cold Spring Harbor Ion Channel and Neural Circuit Physiology Course!
Mai 2022
We are delighted to have Mike Vivian join the lab for his graduate studies! Mike is a second-year PhD student in the Neuroscience Graduate Program. Prior to joining Brandeis, he received a B.S. in Neuroscience with minors in Chemistry and Neuroengineering from the University of Alabama at Birmingham. Mike is currently exploring how spatial representations in the hippocampus update during reversal learning. In his free time, you can find him reading historical nonfiction, wandering the streets of Waltham, and socializing with other students in the Life Sciences. Welcome, Mike!
April 2022
Wohoo! The lab wins its first external funding. We are deeply grateful to the Smith Family Foundation for the Smith Family Award for Excellence in Biomedical Research.
March 2022
The lab welcomes three more rotation students. Welcome Adriana Prada, Kirsten Judge, and Mike Vivian. Let the sciencing begin!
February 2022
The lab welcomes Aanchal Bhatia, postdoctoral fellow. Aanchal will kick off the in vivo whole-cell recordings in the lab!
January 2022
Happy New Year!
Christine gives a talk at the 2022 Park City Winter Conference on Learning and Memory.
The lab welcomes its first two rotation students. Welcome Rico Rodriguez and Edward L. Rivera! We look forward to doing a lot of science together!
The lab is featured in the Brandeis Hoot. Thanks a lot to Shruthi Manjunath for the interview.
December 2021
Christine's latest research is out as a pre-print. Our work demonstrates a new role for the entorhinal cortex as instructor of learning-related place cell representations in CA1. No study is ever perfect, so comments are welcome!
September 2021
Natalie joins the lab as technician. Welcome Natalie!
Christine gave a talk at Brandeis' annual Volen retreat (held in a beautiful hotel on the beach on Cape Cod).
Setting up the lab is underway!
July 2021
The lab is officially open!
June 2021
Christine is an instructor at the Cold Spring Harbor Ion Channel Course. Despite being virtual, everyone got to patch. It was a lot of fun!
June 2021
Christine gave at talk at the International Conference of Mathematical Neuroscience. You can find the talk on Youtube. Check it out. Any feedback is welcome.