Anusha Allawala

4 people in a booth with neuroscience jewelry

We are ready to see you tomorrow at #SfN25 at the #ArtofNeuroscience exhibit!

Meet the crew: Danny, @isabel-luna.bsky.social, Tera, @ellieho21.bsky.social and me!!

We have lots of new stuff for you this year!

Please share! Going to #SfN and looking for a postdoc in human neuroscience? We're hiring! If you have a background in Psychology, Neuroscience, Biomedical Engineering, or related areas, come talk to us about joining our lab at Georgia Tech (siplab.gatech.edu). #neuroscience #PsychSciSky

UC to Stop Funding Systemwide Postdoc Program Established in 1984 to encourage women and minority Ph.D.s to pursue academia, the program has attracted right-wing criticism for prioritizing diverse candidates.

this is devastating for so many reasons and honestly, shame on the UC. Was hoping to keep the high going after Mamdani's win only come to falling back to earth and register that this country does not want us to succeed. www.insidehighered.com/news/faculty...

The adaptive value of stubborn goals Humans exhibit a striking tendency to persist with chosen goals. This strong attachment to goals can often appear irrational – a perspective captured by terms such as perseverance or sunk-cost biases. In this review, we explore how goal commitment could stem from several adaptive mechanisms, including those that optimise cognitive resources, shield decisions from interference, and scaffold motivation in the absence of accessible reward signals. We propose that these computational considerations have important implications for algorithmic architectures supporting decision making, including separate algorithms for goal selection and implementation, and for monitoring ongoing goals versus alternative sources of reward. Finally, we discuss how a variety of mechanisms supporting goal commitment and abandonment could relate to dimensions affected in mental health.

Online Now: The adaptive value of stubborn goals

Cognitive modeling of real-world behavior for understanding mental health A core strength of computational psychiatry is its focus on theory-driven research, in which cognitive processes are precisely quantified using computational models that formalize specific theoretical mechanisms. However, the data used in these studies often come from traditional laboratory-based cognitive tasks, which have unclear ecological validity. In this review we propose that the same theoretical frameworks and computational models can be applied to real-world data such as experience sampling, passive data, and digital-behavior data (e.g., online activity such as on social media). In turn, modeling real-world data can benefit from a theory-driven computational approach to move from purely predictive to explanatory power. We illustrate these points using emerging studies and discuss the challenges and opportunities of using real-world data in computational psychiatry.

Online Now: Cognitive modeling of real-world behavior for understanding mental health

Very happy to share my first preprint from @oxexppsy.bsky.social @oxneuro.bsky.social ! We (me + co-first authors @lilweb.bsky.social @mirunarascu.bsky.social + PI @mkflugge.bsky.social + many others) used transcranial focused ultrasound stimulation (TUS/tFUS/LIFU) of the human amygdala ... (1/15)

Beyond Mechanism—Extending Our Concepts of Causation in Neuroscience The search for neural mechanisms of behaviour often relies on a synchronic, driving view of causation, where neural activity drives more neural activity, which eventually drives behaviour. The real c....

But if re-reading it is a chore, you could try our recent paper, where Aristotle's causes get a look in... 😉 onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/...

UCSF neurologist and pain medicine specialist Prasad Shrivalkar, MD, PhD, standing in front of a whiteboard. Photo: Anastasiia Sapon.

One of the biggest challenges to treating chronic pain lies in reliably measuring how much pain someone is feeling. But @shirvalkarlab.bsky.social has shown that they can predict when someone’s going to be in significant pain by tracking their brain activity: magazine.ucsf.edu/can-we-train... 🧪 🧠🟦

Heads-up! The one-page abstract submission deadline for @embs.org's 12th Annual International Conference on #NeuralEngineering is less than a week away. Get your #NER2025 submissions in no later than 11 Aug 2025. More info here: neuro.embs.org/2025/full-co... #brain #neurotech #neurotechnology

A human brain network linked to restoration of consciousness after deep brain stimulation - Nature Communications In people with severe brain injuries, stimulation restored consciousness by engaging a deep brain circuit for wakefulness—revealing a target that may also guide treatment in stroke and epilepsy.

Just dropped in @natcomms.nature.com: we show that re-engaging a thalamic–ventral tegmental circuit with deep brain stimulation can reignite consciousness in patients with severe brain injury. Work led by Aaron Warren, with @andreashorn.org @foxmdphd.bsky.social @ others! tinyurl.com/4kz8j89b

Yes just got my NoA!! Crossing fingers it’s re-instated for others!

HALLELUJAH my fellowship is re-instated. So thankful I lost 15 years off my life and 90% of my water-weight from all the tears

let's hope, I'd submitted!!

Always so uplifting to see Katie and see all the amazing things her lab is doing now!!!!! Make the time to be good mentors folks, it makes a world of a difference.

Hand holding two sparkly black brain pins

I had a wonderful time today visiting w @neuronush.bsky.social and talking to the students in the summer undergrad research program she & @christineliu.art run. They helped fill in the gaps from all the cancelled summer programs, funded w sales from these amazing pins. 🧪

Zohran looking out on a victory night crowd.

In the words of Nelson Mandela: it always seems impossible until it’s done.

My friends, it is done. And you are the ones who did it.

I am honored to be your Democratic nominee for the Mayor of New York City.

The do’s and don’ts of scientific image editing Acceptable image-editing practices are partly a matter of common sense. But researchers say journals and funders could help scientists by standardizing policies.

Early Career #EinsteinFoundationAward winner PixelQuality (@helenajambor.bsky.social and @chrischmied.bsky.social) has developed checklists to improve standards for scientific images, which four @natureportfolio.nature.com journals began trialling in May.
www.nature.com/articles/d41...

Inferring internal states across mice and monkeys using facial features - Nature Communications Here, the authors created a virtual reality task for monkeys and mice to explore if internal states like attention are similar across species. Their facial expressions during the task were similar, su...

Now out in @natcomms.nature.com‬: Mice and monkeys spontaneously shift through comparable cognitive states - and it's written all over their faces! (1/7)
www.nature.com/articles/s41...

this is so cute I cannot

It's a win-win scenario! get some beautiful pins and support the next generation of trainees in science!

Closed-loop control of theta oscillations enhances human hippocampal network connectivity - Nature Communications Closed-loop brain stimulation of the human hippocampal theta rhythm produces lasting enhancement of network communication. This implicates theta rhythms in human hippocampal network communication and ...

Closed-loop control of theta oscillations enhances human hippocampal network connectivity
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
#neuroscience

Currently doing a big sale on the twophotonart.com shop to fundraiser for the summer program too!

10% off your order all month and 20% goes toward pizza, parking passes, and whatever else the students might need!

Join us this summer!! You’ll learn all about computational neuroscience and neural engineering in psychiatric research and more!

Summer Research Program in Neuroscience & Computation For undergrads interested in exploring the brain and learning how to code No prior experience necessary! June - August 2025 UCSF Mission Bay campus 25-30 hours/week commitment Learn more & apply: http://tiny.cc/ucsfcompneuro/ Students from backgrounds historically underrepresented in STEM are encouraged to apply!

New opportunity for Bay Area undergrads to gain computational neuroscience exposure and training!

I’m teaming up with @neuronush.bsky.social to offer this to students in our communities 💕🧠🧪

Please share with any students who might be interested!

Tiny.cc/ucsfcompneuro

This is a great explainer of just how much trouble NIH-funded scientists are about to be in. 😨

In short, there are actual data showing that in extramural NIH grant competition, Black PIs have to work twice* as hard to be considered half** as good.

DESPITE all of the NIH DEI efforts that were in place at the time.

*much more than twice
**about 60.5% of the success rate

Just got word that our Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI) Inclusive Excellence 3 (IE3) Grant was being canceled. All 100+ institutions. So even private funding is susceptible to this administration’s unraveling of DEI initiatives

Step 1) find your rep

www.congress.gov/members/find...

Step 2) send an email or call their office

Step 3) tell them that federal spending on scientific advancement is the best hope we have to “win against china” or whatever these guys are obsessed with these days

I can't believe *this* is my first post on bluesky but WHAT THE ACTUAL F