Journal Paper Tutorial class for PNI

Purpose: To expose students to research articles in neuroscience.
Each week you will have read one scientific paper before class. During class, we will discuss the claims and results of the paper while also learning how to read scientific papers.

Class details

Meets: Mondays, 7:30pm - 9pm (zoom link will be sent before each class) (Oct. 19 - Nov. 16, 2020)
Instructor: Dr. Benjamin Cowley
Grade (second half of semester): Depends on class participation (20%) and a final paper (30%)

Papers to read

Come with one question about the paper to share for every class.

Oct. 19, 2020:
No class.

Oct. 26, 2020:
Pillow, Jonathan W., et al. "Spatio-temporal correlations and visual signalling in a complete neuronal population." Nature 454.7207 (2008): 995-999.

Nov. 2, 2020:
Behnia, Rudy, et al. "Processing properties of ON and OFF pathways for Drosophila motion detection." Nature 512.7515 (2014): 427-430.

Nov. 9, 2020:
Chen, Janice, et al. "Shared memories reveal shared structure in neural activity across individuals." Nature neuroscience 20.1 (2017): 115-125.

Nov. 16, 2020:
Yamins, Daniel LK, et al. "Performance-optimized hierarchical models predict neural responses in higher visual cortex." Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 111.23 (2014): 8619-8624.

Final paper

A large portion (30%) of your grade is the final paper for this half-semester. You will choose one of the four papers we have discussed and write about it. The paper will be no more than 7 pages long. Please see your syllabus for further information.
The paper will be due Jan. 10 at 5pm, e-mailed (as a pdf) to the course instructor.