Insect neuroethology: From brains and behaviours to models and robots.

The Brains on Board project is delighted to host a one-day workshop on insect neuroethology and computational neuroscience at the University of Sussex. We are enthused about the prospect of bringing together neuroscientists, modellers and behavioural scientists, who work on insect sensory systems, learning and cognition. We particularly welcome interest from early career researchers, who would benefit greatly from this networking opportunity.

The workshop will be an all-day event at the University of Sussex on Thursday 14th June. Talks will commence at 0930 and a wine reception with posters will run until 1900. Informal evening events will be organised in Brighton for Wednesday and Thursday evenings, and Friday will present an opportunity for lab tours and additional meetings, should people be interested.

Special Guest Speakers.

Professor Tom Collett – University of Sussex
Dr Andrew Barron – Macquarie University

Cost.

The workshop is free to attend, including a buffet lunch, tea and coffee, and the wine reception.

Applications.

Places are limited. Please use the link below to register your intention to attend, indicating your desire to present a poster or talk. Talk slots will be preferentially allocated to people with exciting new findings that they are eager to publicise. Please register your interest by Monday 14th May.

Queries.

Please contact Dr Paul Graham <p.r.graham@sussex.ac.uk>

Click here to register

Final Schedule

Talks: Pevensey 1 1A6; Posters and lunch: Chichester 1 Ground Floor. Future Technologies Labevensey 1 1A6; Posters and lunch: Chichester 1 Ground Floor. Future Technologies Lab

09:00 - 09:30Welcome and Coffee
09:30 - 11:00Session 1 (Chair James Marshall)
Paul GrahamUniversity of SussexRunning paths to nowhere: Route extinction reveals aspects of cue weighting and route learning
HaDi MaBouDiUniversity of SheffieldActive vision in bees: building a visual representation of the environment over time
Thiery HoinvilleBielefeld UniversityOptimal multi guidance integration in insect navigation
Vivek NityanandaNewcastle UniversityPrey detection, 3d vision and second order motion sensitivity in the praying mantis
11:00 - 11:30Coffee
11:30 - 13:00Session 2 (Chair Andy Philippides)
Vera VasasQueen Mary University of LondonRandom connections and a single interneuron type can explain the large diversity of physiological properties of colour-coding neurons in the bee medulla
Matthew CollettUniversity of ExeterHow does the central complex use mushroom body output for steering?
Tom CollettUniversity of Sussex'Dancing under a cloud - How do bees do it?'
Alex CopeUniversity of SheffieldSimultaneous localisation and mapping in the insect brain?
13:00 - 14:00Lunch and poster session (Chichester 1 Ground Floor. Future Technologies Lab)
14:00 - 15:00Session 3 (Chair Mike Mangan)
Emily BairdLund UniversityImaging the evolution of visual adaptations
Olivier BertrandBielefeld UniversityNavipy: A toolbox to model insect navigation
James BennettUniversity of SussexLearning with reward prediction errors in the travelling salesbee
15:00 - 15:30Coffee
15:30 - 16:15Session 4 (Chair Thomas Nowotny)
Nathan LeporaUniversity of BristolBiomimetic touch and insect navigation
Tianqi WeiUniversity of EdinburghA bio-inspired reinforcement learning rule to optimise dynamical neural networks for robot control
16:15 - 16:30Short Break
16:30 - 17:15Closing Session (Chair Paul Graham)
Andrew BarronMacquarie UniversityInsect Neuroethology: Future and prospects
17:15 - 19:00Poster session and wine reception (Chichester 1 Ground Floor. Future Technologies Lab)