Princeton Neuroscience Institute

Biological brains have the upper hand over AI in at least one crucial domain: flexibility. New work from the lab of @princeton.edu's @timbuschman.bsky.social finds "cognitive Legos"— reusable patterns of brain activity—support rapid, efficient learning in primates.

pni.princeton.edu/news/2025/co...

Congrats to Kirsten Ziman and Isaac Christian on their two recent fMRI publications coming out of the Graziano Lab! @princetonneuro.bsky.social

direct.mit.edu/jocn/article...

academic.oup.com/cercor/artic...

Scientists Pinpoint the Moment of Decision in the Rat Brain Simons Collaboration on the Global Brain researchers found a synchronized shift in neural activity that signals the moment when animals commit to a decision.

How do you pinpoint the moment when a brain makes up its mind about a decision?

@racheltompa.bsky.social wrote a lovely short article for the general public on answers found by @thomas-zhihao-luo.bsky.social and @timkimd.bsky.social when they were in my lab.

@simonsfoundation.org

bit.ly/43DiM70

Super happy to see this review out! We ask why people are so reluctant to abandon goals and how this commitment could be understood computationally. Work with Jill O'Reilly & @yaelniv.bsky.social

Our work with @pawa-pawa.bsky.social is out in Nature Machine Intelligence! The choice of activation function affects the representations, dynamics, and circuit solutions that emerge in RNNs trained on cognitive tasks. Activation matters!
www.nature.com/articles/s42...

The Transmitter Christina Kim - assistant professor, HHMI Freeman Hrabowski Scholar, Princeton University Rising Star in Neuroscience 2025

Congratulations to @tinakim-neuro.bsky.social on being named one of the 2025 "Rising Stars in Neuroscience" by @thetransmitter.bsky.social! Kim was recognized for her many early career scientific contributions and dedication to mentoring and community building 🌟

📰: pni.princeton.edu/news/2025/tr...

Thank you @emilysingerneuro.bsky.social ! Yes, please share your research stories! So many great things to showcase to the public!

bsky.app/profile/carl...

Looks like some good times in San Diego! 🫶 #SfN25

Nobel laureate John Hopfield and alumna Fei-Fei Li honored by King Charles III Hopfield and Li were among seven AI luminaries awarded the 2025 Queen Elizabeth Prize for Engineering.

Congratulations to Nobel laureate and Princeton professor emeritus John Hopfield and alumna @drfeifei.bsky.social '99 who received the 2025 @qeprize.bsky.social for “their pioneering contributions to the development of modern machine learning.”

6 black-and-white images of a person typing on a keyboard

New Princeton research gives insight into human cognition and could help scientists build better AI models: https://bit.ly/3Lp6J74

Congrats to the whole BICAN team on an exciting raft of papers, including work from the lab of PNI's @fennak.bsky.social!

The Case That A.I. Is Thinking ChatGPT does not have an inner life. Yet it seems to know what it’s talking about.

The best write up on the state of AI in a while, from James Somers, with input from my Princeton colleagues Ken Norman, Uri Hasson, Jon Cohen, and many others. Coding with LLMs was a striking moment for me too www.newyorker.com/magazine/202...

On Oct 24, more than 60 postdoctoral fellows and graduate students gathered for the first Rutgers Brain Health Institute x Princeton Neuroscience Institute Social Science Mixer — a new initiative designed to strengthen scientific & social connections across New Jersey’s two major #neuroscience hubs.

Human brains put in more effort when the opportunity to learn arises, the finding could help researchers build better AI In a research paper published in PNAS, Princeton Neuroscience Institute researchers present their results finding that people will forgo short-term rewards in favor of investing more effort when the o...

A new paper from @princetonneuro.bsky.social scientists shows people will forgo short-term rewards in favor of investing more effort when the opportunity for learning arises. The results could help researchers build better AI.

Read now: ai.princeton.edu/news/2025/hu...

STAT Wunderkinds '25 Photo of Sven Dorkenwald (he/him) Affiliations: Allen Institute and University of Washington

@sdorkenw.bsky.social's story is one that almost wasn't (aspiring physicist-turned-neuroscientist) -- learn how he wound up studying the complex connections between neurons.

📰: statnews.com/wunderkinds/...

STAT Wunderkinds '25 Photo of Jessie Muir (she/her) Affiliations: Princeton University

@jessiemuir10.bsky.social's story starts in the suburbs of Montreal, where she was inspired to ask big questions from her uncle at age 6. Now, Muir pinpoints specific neurons involved in depression that are responsive to psychedelics.

📰: statnews.com/wunderkinds/...

Photo of 2025 STAT Wunderkinds awardees Jessiue Muir (left) and Sven Dorkenwald (right) and Jessie Muir

Congrats to PNI postdoc @jessiemuir10.bsky.social (@tinakim-neuro.bsky.social lab) + neuroscience PhD alumnus @sdorkenw.bsky.social *23 (Murthy + @sebastianseung.bsky.social labs) on being recognized as two of @statnews.com's 2025 Wunderkinds!

📰: statnews.com/wunderkinds/

#STATWunderkinds

How FlyWire is redefining Drosophila research, one year in Nine Drosophila researchers share how the connectome transformed the field and what additional new tools they would like to see.

One year ago, the team at FlyWire led by Princeton's Mala Murthy and @sebastianseung.bsky.social published the first-ever complete connectome of an adult female fruit fly brain.

@thetransmitter.bsky.social talks with scientists about how they're using FlyWire's data to make their own discoveries.

Today my @nytimes.com colleagues and I are launching a new series called Lost Science. We interview US scientists who can no longer discover something new about our world, thanks to this year‘s cuts. Here is my first interview with a scientist who studied bees and fires. Gift link: nyti.ms/3IWXbiE

Has Your Scientific Work Been Cut? We Want to Hear.

NYT is looking for scientists to tell them about their projects that were cut by the administration for a new series on “lost science”: www.nytimes.com/2025/10/08/c...

O’Shea awarded a NJ ACTS translational science fellowship MD/PhD student Callan O’Shea, a member of the Princeton University Department of Molecular Biology (MOL), is the newest recipient of the New Jersey Alliance for Clinical and Translational Science Awar...

Congrats🥂 to Callan O’Shea, a MolBio M.D./Ph.D student and newest recipient of the New Jersey Alliance for Clinical and Translational Science Award (NJ ACTS) T32 Fellowship. O'Shea is advised by associated faculty member Sam Wang. molbio.princeton.edu/news/2025/os...

How FlyWire is redefining Drosophila research, one year in Nine Drosophila researchers share how the connectome transformed the field and what additional new tools they would like to see.

To celebrate the first anniversary of the release of FlyWire, we asked nine neuroscientists to share how they are using connectome data in their research and what they hope is in store for the future of fly connectomics.

By @franciscorr25.bsky.social

#neuroskyence

bit.ly/3Wx5nt3

Princeton Engineering - Christina Kim, an expert in the brain and behavior, named Freeman Hrabowski Scholar by Howard Hughes Medical Institute The Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI) has named Christina K. Kim a Freeman Hrabowski Scholar, supporting her research on how modifications in brain

Congratulations to PNI's @tinakim-neuro.bsky.social on being named a @hhmi.org Freeman Hrabowski Scholar, which will support her research on how modifications in brain cells result in long-lasting changes in behavior!!
engineering.princeton.edu/news/2025/10...

We're Hiring. Assistant professor in the area of human cognitive neuroscience. Princeton University shield logo subbrand lockup with the Princeton Neuroscience Institute (PNI) and Dept of Psychology logos. Background photo = PNI and psychology building (Peretsman Scully Hall).

We're hiring! The Princeton Neuroscience Institute and Department of Psychology invite applications for a joint hire Assistant Professor in human cognitive neuroscience 🧠

Review of applications begin Oct 15. More details here: puwebp.princeton.edu/AcadHire/app...

TITLE TEXT: "CV Starr Postdoctoral Fellowship Opportunity" BODY TEXT: "The Princeton Neuroscience Institute invites collaborative scientists with exceptional skills and potential to apply for the 3-year CV Starr Fellowship program, which provides an attractive salary and a modest research budget. Applications due October 10, 2025."

⏰ Deadline approaching — apply for the PNI C.V. Starr Fellowship by Oct 10!

🧠 Up to 3 years of salary and research support, along with world-class faculty mentorship and facilities.

🔗 Learn more: pni.princeton.edu/apply/postdo...

When a rat makes up its mind, these neuroscientists know Scientists can now freeze-frame the exact moment an animal makes up their mind and commits to a choice — simply by looking at their brain activity

With the help of AI, Princeton’s @thomas-zhihao-luo.bsky.social and @carlosbrody.bsky.social can now pinpoint the exact moment a rat makes up its mind — just by reading its brain activity 🧠🐀
pni.princeton.edu/news/2025/wh...

#NeuroJobs

#NeuroJobs

Love how this project came together with the amazing @endoeartha.bsky.social ! Have you wondered about the role that testosterone plays in the ability to re-pattern social behavior when you are at home in your "territory" vs away? We have answers for you...

Very excited and proud to share my postdoctoral research with @neurrriot.bsky.social looking at the context-specific encoding of social behavior 💃🕺 in hormone-sensitive, large-scale brain networks in mice!

www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

#neuroskyence #compneurosky 🧪
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