Selmaan Chettih
@selmaan.bsky.social
here for the brains | https://selmaan.github.io
Reposted by Selmaan Chettih
A reminder to anyone interested in #brains #birds or behaviour, our new book is available for FREE as an ebook in addition to print copies.
#neuroethology #neuroskyence #ornithology 🧪🧠🪶
direct.mit.edu/books/oa-mon...
#neuroethology #neuroskyence #ornithology 🧪🧠🪶
direct.mit.edu/books/oa-mon...
Bird Brains and Behavior: A Synthesis
From two avian neurobiologists, a captivating deep dive into the mechanisms that control avian behavior.The last few decades have produced extensive resear
direct.mit.edu
November 20, 2025 at 11:58 AM
A reminder to anyone interested in #brains #birds or behaviour, our new book is available for FREE as an ebook in addition to print copies.
#neuroethology #neuroskyence #ornithology 🧪🧠🪶
direct.mit.edu/books/oa-mon...
#neuroethology #neuroskyence #ornithology 🧪🧠🪶
direct.mit.edu/books/oa-mon...
I’m so excited to be a part of this! Looking forward to interesting dialogues btw researchers already working at a massive scale and those trying to grow out ‘bespoke’ systems (like myself w/ chickadee neuroscience)
Meet our 2025 cohort of Next Generation Leaders! For the next 3 years, they will network with other rising stars, participate in professional development, and share their ideas for future research directions.
November 5, 2025 at 6:39 PM
I’m so excited to be a part of this! Looking forward to interesting dialogues btw researchers already working at a massive scale and those trying to grow out ‘bespoke’ systems (like myself w/ chickadee neuroscience)
Reposted by Selmaan Chettih
🚨Our preprint is online!🚨
www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...
How do #dopamine neurons perform the key calculations in reinforcement #learning?
Read on to find out more! 🧵
www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...
How do #dopamine neurons perform the key calculations in reinforcement #learning?
Read on to find out more! 🧵
September 19, 2025 at 1:05 PM
🚨Our preprint is online!🚨
www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...
How do #dopamine neurons perform the key calculations in reinforcement #learning?
Read on to find out more! 🧵
www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...
How do #dopamine neurons perform the key calculations in reinforcement #learning?
Read on to find out more! 🧵
Reposted by Selmaan Chettih
My first paper with @naoshigeuchida.bsky.social is finally out in @natcomms.nature.com ! rdcu.be/eACGf
TL;DR: asymmetric learning rates can be induced by shifts in tonic dopamine giving rise to pessimistic/optimistic biases in agents or animals undergoing reinforcement learning .
TL;DR: asymmetric learning rates can be induced by shifts in tonic dopamine giving rise to pessimistic/optimistic biases in agents or animals undergoing reinforcement learning .
Tonic dopamine and biases in value learning linked through a biologically inspired reinforcement learning model
Nature Communications - Accurate future predictions are essential for guiding behavior, and disruptions in this process are associated with psychiatric disorders. Here the authors show that changes...
rdcu.be
August 13, 2025 at 9:55 PM
My first paper with @naoshigeuchida.bsky.social is finally out in @natcomms.nature.com ! rdcu.be/eACGf
TL;DR: asymmetric learning rates can be induced by shifts in tonic dopamine giving rise to pessimistic/optimistic biases in agents or animals undergoing reinforcement learning .
TL;DR: asymmetric learning rates can be induced by shifts in tonic dopamine giving rise to pessimistic/optimistic biases in agents or animals undergoing reinforcement learning .
Reposted by Selmaan Chettih
Come visit Calcutta in the last week of August and see some amazing neuroscientists talk about the neural basis of behaviour at @behaviour2025.bsky.social
With @neuroetho.bsky.social @danielavallentin.bsky.social @selmaan.bsky.social @arkarupbanerjee.bsky.social and Michael Brecht!
With @neuroetho.bsky.social @danielavallentin.bsky.social @selmaan.bsky.social @arkarupbanerjee.bsky.social and Michael Brecht!
June 28, 2025 at 8:49 AM
Come visit Calcutta in the last week of August and see some amazing neuroscientists talk about the neural basis of behaviour at @behaviour2025.bsky.social
With @neuroetho.bsky.social @danielavallentin.bsky.social @selmaan.bsky.social @arkarupbanerjee.bsky.social and Michael Brecht!
With @neuroetho.bsky.social @danielavallentin.bsky.social @selmaan.bsky.social @arkarupbanerjee.bsky.social and Michael Brecht!
Reposted by Selmaan Chettih
My latest Aronov lab paper is now published @Nature!
When a chickadee looks at a distant location, the same place cells activate as if it were actually there 👁️
The hippocampus encodes where the bird is looking, AND what it expects to see next -- enabling spatial reasoning from afar
bit.ly/3HvWSum
When a chickadee looks at a distant location, the same place cells activate as if it were actually there 👁️
The hippocampus encodes where the bird is looking, AND what it expects to see next -- enabling spatial reasoning from afar
bit.ly/3HvWSum
June 11, 2025 at 10:24 PM
My latest Aronov lab paper is now published @Nature!
When a chickadee looks at a distant location, the same place cells activate as if it were actually there 👁️
The hippocampus encodes where the bird is looking, AND what it expects to see next -- enabling spatial reasoning from afar
bit.ly/3HvWSum
When a chickadee looks at a distant location, the same place cells activate as if it were actually there 👁️
The hippocampus encodes where the bird is looking, AND what it expects to see next -- enabling spatial reasoning from afar
bit.ly/3HvWSum
So excited to see @hannahpayne.bsky.social‘s paper out today: rdcu.be/eqAd4
It’s a beautiful result, and using a great model species for this question makes it powerfully clear and simple. Scaling up tools in a single model system won’t get you there on its own!
It’s a beautiful result, and using a great model species for this question makes it powerfully clear and simple. Scaling up tools in a single model system won’t get you there on its own!
Remote activation of place codes by gaze in a highly visual animal
Nature - Place cells in the chickadee hippocampus coherently represent locations in space, whether physically visited or viewed, enabling spatial reasoning at a distance through a unified process...
rdcu.be
June 11, 2025 at 9:42 PM
So excited to see @hannahpayne.bsky.social‘s paper out today: rdcu.be/eqAd4
It’s a beautiful result, and using a great model species for this question makes it powerfully clear and simple. Scaling up tools in a single model system won’t get you there on its own!
It’s a beautiful result, and using a great model species for this question makes it powerfully clear and simple. Scaling up tools in a single model system won’t get you there on its own!
Reposted by Selmaan Chettih
Reposted by Selmaan Chettih
"We will never use this agency to censor scientists who disagree. If scientists are censored, we can't have excellent science."
-NIH Director Jay Bhattacharya.
9 days ago on Fox and Friends.
-NIH Director Jay Bhattacharya.
9 days ago on Fox and Friends.
Exclusive: US NIH scientists barred from attending conferences on their own time and dime
Researchers at the U.S. National Institutes of Health have been told they cannot attend scientific conferences and meetings without official permission, even if they pay their own way and go during time off, three current and former NIH scientists told Reuters.
www.reuters.com
April 10, 2025 at 6:46 PM
"We will never use this agency to censor scientists who disagree. If scientists are censored, we can't have excellent science."
-NIH Director Jay Bhattacharya.
9 days ago on Fox and Friends.
-NIH Director Jay Bhattacharya.
9 days ago on Fox and Friends.
My first paper as a senior/corresponding author, had a fantastic experience with the eLife model! Revised manuscript coming soon
How does barcode activity in the hippocampus enable precise and flexible memory? How does this relate to key-value memory systems? Our work (w/ Jack Lindsey, Larry Abbott, Dmitriy Aronov, @selmaan.bsky.social ) is now in eLife as a reviewed preprint: elifesciences.org/reviewed-pre...
Barcode activity in a recurrent network model of the hippocampus enables efficient memory binding
elifesciences.org
March 24, 2025 at 9:45 PM
My first paper as a senior/corresponding author, had a fantastic experience with the eLife model! Revised manuscript coming soon
Reposted by Selmaan Chettih
Hi friends, If you haven't seen it already, I was part of a mess this week — about science in the United States, and about NIH research aimed at understanding things like Alzheimer's, schizophrenia, autism, and depression.
🧪 Thread with some details. 🧠📈 🧠🤖
1/10
🧪 Thread with some details. 🧠📈 🧠🤖
1/10
Compelling pushback from @jmgrohneuro.bsky.social and the Board of Scientific Counselors at the National Institute on Mental Health (NIMH) regarding termination of tenure-track investigators driven by DOGE.
1/2
1/2
March 10, 2025 at 3:59 AM
Hi friends, If you haven't seen it already, I was part of a mess this week — about science in the United States, and about NIH research aimed at understanding things like Alzheimer's, schizophrenia, autism, and depression.
🧪 Thread with some details. 🧠📈 🧠🤖
1/10
🧪 Thread with some details. 🧠📈 🧠🤖
1/10
Reposted by Selmaan Chettih
How does the brain work in natural scenarios, in multi-animal societies of wild animals? 🧠 🧪 🦇
doi.org/10.1126/scie...
(1/n)
doi.org/10.1126/scie...
(1/n)
January 30, 2025 at 7:20 PM
How does the brain work in natural scenarios, in multi-animal societies of wild animals? 🧠 🧪 🦇
doi.org/10.1126/scie...
(1/n)
doi.org/10.1126/scie...
(1/n)
Reposted by Selmaan Chettih
Congrats to @maxkozlov.bsky.social and @avaskham.bsky.social for having this story first, and glad the NYT picked it up from them and is sending it out to a broader audience.
Trump Administration Stalls Scientific Research Despite Court Ruling. Story by Ben Mueller. Gift link: nyti.ms/435szDm
Trump Administration Stalls Scientific Research Despite Court Ruling (Gift Article)
Using an arcane law, officials have effectively delayed funding from the National Institutes of Health, leaving medical studies in jeopardy.
nyti.ms
February 22, 2025 at 12:19 AM
Congrats to @maxkozlov.bsky.social and @avaskham.bsky.social for having this story first, and glad the NYT picked it up from them and is sending it out to a broader audience.
Reposted by Selmaan Chettih
Further musings about how food-hoarding titmice and chickadees remember the locations of their caches....
link.springer.com/10.1007/s100...
link.springer.com/10.1007/s100...
What is the nature of cache memory in Parids? A comment on Chettih et al. 2024 - Animal Cognition
Recent findings by Chettih et al. (Cell 187: 1922–1935, 2024) from electrophysiological recordings in the hippocampus of black-capped chickadees shed light on the debate about how food-hoarding Parids...
link.springer.com
February 12, 2025 at 8:17 PM
Further musings about how food-hoarding titmice and chickadees remember the locations of their caches....
link.springer.com/10.1007/s100...
link.springer.com/10.1007/s100...
This includes NY11, ie Staten Island
These are the GOP members of the House Ways and Means Committee--THEY'RE some of the people hiding while DOGE disrupts Medicare/Medicaid and NIH funding.
If they are YOUR representative, consider a visit to their LOCAL OFFICE this week, while they're home, to explain why they need to oversee DOGE.
If they are YOUR representative, consider a visit to their LOCAL OFFICE this week, while they're home, to explain why they need to oversee DOGE.
February 18, 2025 at 2:56 PM
This includes NY11, ie Staten Island
Reposted by Selmaan Chettih
🔥 take on 🧪 industry silence to NIH changes: '“three levels of corruption” ... Biopharma CEOs: what will protect you then? Speak up, speak up now. Because as it stands, you're forming up on the wrong side of a very important line. Time will not be kind.' www.science.org/content/blog...
Stand Up And Be Counted
www.science.org
February 12, 2025 at 5:02 PM
🔥 take on 🧪 industry silence to NIH changes: '“three levels of corruption” ... Biopharma CEOs: what will protect you then? Speak up, speak up now. Because as it stands, you're forming up on the wrong side of a very important line. Time will not be kind.' www.science.org/content/blog...
Reposted by Selmaan Chettih
Interested in understanding how things work? In particular the tools you use to study the brain? Join us at TENSS 2025 where we brainstorm ideas, build and debug microscopes, electrophysiology and behavior rigs amidst the picturesque Transylvanian hills! tenss.ro
Apply by: February 16th!
Apply by: February 16th!
January 14, 2025 at 4:58 AM
Interested in understanding how things work? In particular the tools you use to study the brain? Join us at TENSS 2025 where we brainstorm ideas, build and debug microscopes, electrophysiology and behavior rigs amidst the picturesque Transylvanian hills! tenss.ro
Apply by: February 16th!
Apply by: February 16th!
Who’s calling who funky 😡
December 22, 2024 at 5:34 PM
Who’s calling who funky 😡
Reposted by Selmaan Chettih
my lab (www.tuthill.casa) at UW is hiring a research assistant/tech. basic scope is to apply machine learning/computer vision tools to measure and model 3D animal behavior and mechanics. we are a diverse, collaborative, curiosity-driven group.
Apply: uwhires.admin.washington.edu/ENG/Candidat...
Apply: uwhires.admin.washington.edu/ENG/Candidat...
December 19, 2024 at 6:48 PM
my lab (www.tuthill.casa) at UW is hiring a research assistant/tech. basic scope is to apply machine learning/computer vision tools to measure and model 3D animal behavior and mechanics. we are a diverse, collaborative, curiosity-driven group.
Apply: uwhires.admin.washington.edu/ENG/Candidat...
Apply: uwhires.admin.washington.edu/ENG/Candidat...
Reposted by Selmaan Chettih
in time for the holidays - whether you’re looking for a gift for some else or you are looking to stock up for your own winter break - here are some terrific leads on science authors of all sorts! Recommended browse through & follow.
go.bsky.app/2LmKSDN
go.bsky.app/2LmKSDN
December 8, 2024 at 5:50 PM
in time for the holidays - whether you’re looking for a gift for some else or you are looking to stock up for your own winter break - here are some terrific leads on science authors of all sorts! Recommended browse through & follow.
go.bsky.app/2LmKSDN
go.bsky.app/2LmKSDN