Rockwood Memorial Lecture

2017

INC sponsors the H. Paul Rockwood Memorial Lectureship held annually. The Rockwood Memorial Lectureship Fund was gifted to the Institute by Mr. and Mrs. Jerome Rockwood in memory of their late son's interest, studies, and work in the neural computation field.

The Rockwood Memorial Lectures are endowed by Mr. and Mrs. Jerome Rockwood in memory of their late son, Paul, who received a B.S. in Computer Science from UCSD in 1980 and then obtained a second degree B.A. in Psychology in 1981. In 1983 he started a company, Integral Solutions, to develop a universal language translation, but died tragically in a mountaineering accident before he could fulfill his promise.

Big Science, Team Science, Open Science: In the Service of Neuroscience

Who:
Dr. Christof Koch
President and Chief Scientific Officer, Allen Institute for Brain Science

When:
Monday, April 17th - 4:00-6:00 p.m.

Where:
San Diego Supercomputer Center auditorium, 10100 Hopkins Dr., La Jolla, CA 92093

Click here for flyer

Abstract:

Five years ago, the Allen Institute for Brain Science, a non-profit medical research organization, embarked on an ambitious 10-year initiative to understand the structure and function of the neocortex and associated satellite structures in humans and mice within a team setting. We are setting up high through-put pipelines to exhaustively characterize the morphology, electrophysiology and single-cell transcriptome of cell types (www.brainmap.org) as well as their synaptic interconnections in the laboratory mouse and in human neocortex (via a combination of neurosurgical and post-mortem tissues). We are building brain observatories to image the activities of 10,000s of neurons throughout visual cortex in behaving mice, to record their electrical activities, and to analyze their connectivity at the ultra-structural level. We are constructing biophysically detailed as well as simplified computer simulations of these networks and of their information processing capabilities focusing on how the neocortical tissue gives rise to perception, behavior and consciousness. Anybody can access and view this data over our portal without any restriction. The entire project can also be seen as an experiment in the sociology of brain science.