Austin Benn

\title[PhD Plan for CANDIDATE]{Department of \mbox{Full Luxury Galactic Metascience}\\PhD Plan for CANDIDATE} % list committee members \author[]{Committee:\\ Prof.~MEMBER1\\ Dr.~MEMBER2\\ Dr.~MEMBER3} \date{\today} \begin{document} \maketitle% this prints the handout title, author, and date \begin{marginfigure}[-5.2cm] \includegraphics[width=3.5cm]{Minerva.pdf} \end{marginfigure} \section{Phenomenon} The subject matter to be addressed. What is the question? Citation for background are useful, but don't do a full lit review (yet).\cite{HenrichMcElreath:2003} Additional references can be included at the end bibliography by using \verb|\nocite|. \nocite{NBGA2005} \section{Theoretical Perspective} The framework for explaining the phenomenon. What are the implications of theory? If more than one theory is relevant, how do the implications differ? What are the current holes in the theory or theories? \section{Approach} Modeling and empirical research approach to address the theory/ies nominated above. Important thing is to \emph{justify} the approach in terms of theory. \section{Specifics of Approach} Outline any special skills, equipment, or techniques that will be required. This includes, in the case of field research, a paragraph on the background of the field location. Data analysis approach needs a sketch. Can use citation\cite{Merowetal2014} for further detail. \section{Expected Products} A list of the (usually 3) articles expected for completion of the PhD. Think of each as a fantasy abstract. \begin{enumerate} \item \emph{The Evolution of Human Uniqueness.} There is wide agreement that humans are unique. But it is rarely asked: Have they always been unique? In this paper, we derive a general uniqueness theorem that states that any unique species must have been less unique at some point in the past. This theorem has implications for the achievement of world peace.

\item \emph{Niche Construction, Disease Transmission, and Global Warming: Chaos Deconstructs the Block Chain.} How many buzz words can be combined in a title? In this paper, we find that the natural limit on buzz words in any specific scholarly field is always given by the triangular number $T_n$ where $n$ is one more than the number of tenured faculty in the field. \item \emph{A Bayesian Hierarchical Survival Analysis of Counting Sheep.} Just like all those other models of counting sheep, but this one will be Bayesian. \end{enumerate} \section{Schedule} Outline of the calendar for the work. This is necessarily rough and subject to change. \vspace{1em} \begin{fullwidth} {\centering \begin{longtable}{lll} \toprule \makecell{Date\\(Duration)} & Phase & Comment\\ \midrule \makecell{Jan 2019\\(1 year)} & \makecell{Phase 1} & First wave of being awesome \\ \midrule \makecell{Jan 2020\\(1 year)} & \makecell{Phase 2} & \makecell{Write papers \#1 and \#2} \\ \midrule \makecell{Jan 2021\\(6 months)} & \makecell{Phase 3} & Second wave of awesomeness \\ \midrule \makecell{Jun 2021\\(6 months)} & \makecell{Phase 4} & Write paper \#3 \\ \bottomrule \end{longtable} } \end{fullwidth} \bibliography{bibliography} \bibliographystyle{abbrv}

This November, like every November, I am teaching basic research proposal writing to the new phd cohort at my institute. Here is the 2 page template we start with and adapt. Link to LaTeX github.com/rmcelreath/P...

Sports betting is sadly everywhere these days, but have you tried betting on your running permutation tests ? More of a thrill, less yet more at stake

Oxford is great

This delights me for some reason - a comparative anatomical framework for the brains of 26 carnivore species!

Brain Surfaces of 70 primate species

1
To predict the behaviour of a primate, would you rather base your guess on a closely related species or one with a similar brain shape? We looked at brains & behaviours of 70 species, you’ll be surprised!

🧵Thread on our new preprint with @r3rt0.bsky.social , doi.org/10.1101/2025...

Fitting title for tonight 🥵

Cross-species neuroanatomy in primates using tractography - Brain Structure and Function Due to their integrative role in brain function, long-range white matter connections exhibit high individual variability, giving rise to personalised brain circuits. This neurovariability is more evid...

ping @r3rt0.bsky.social

Cross-species neuroanatomy in primates using tractography | Brain Structure and Function link.springer.com/article/10.1...

No no. That’s perfect

Judge rules against NIH grant cuts — and calls them discriminatory The decision means that the US biomedical agency has to restore funding to hundreds of research projects, but the government will likely appeal.

A US judge has ordered hundreds of terminated research projects at the US National Institutes of Health to be reinstated, calling the processes that led to their cancellation “bereft of reasoning”.

https://go.nature.com/4kOmXDy

Neuroscience Mentorship Program Directory Discover neuroscience mentorship opportunities through this living directory, connecting mentors and mentees at all stages of their careers.

Explore our Mentorship Directory to discover mentorship opportunities from prominent organizations, and build your neuroscience network: www.thetransmitter.org/mentorship-d...

#neuroskyence

Now out in Nature Human Behaviour @nathumbehav.nature.com : “End-to-end topographic networks as models of cortical map formation and human visual behaviour”. Please check our NHB link: www.nature.com/articles/s41...

I forgot for a half second we had raccoons in there 😅. either way have fun with making non-standard surfaces!

Let me know if you run into any problems on the way! Happy to help get things set up or debugged at any stage!

Oooh sounds fun! Do reach out if you run into any trouble running anything! Happy to provide precon_all support and possibly just very interested in also seeing a raccoon brain!

Special shout out to those not on bluesky including Eugene Duff, Borja Ibañez, and where it all started with 🐷's at the Centro Nacional Investigaciones Cardiovascualres in Madrid. And finally if you made it this far I'll confess... no it doesn't work in 🐭... yet 10/10

Finally, this project couldn’t have been done without the support and help of my amazing collaborators including @tingsterx.bsky.social @neuroecologylab.bsky.social @magdalenaboch.bsky.social @josepemanzano.bsky.social @k4tj4.bsky.social @r3rt0.bsky.social. 9/10

GitHub - neurabenn/precon_all: precon_all surface pipline precon_all surface pipline. Contribute to neurabenn/precon_all development by creating an account on GitHub.

For all the details check out our preprint www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1... , or better yet, run it yourself, the code is here: github.com/neurabenn/pr.... 8/10

Then use precon_all to automate the cortical surface reconstruction for you! Better yet, create a surface template for spatial normalization using your unique species data 7/10

All of this means that precon_all can give you a cortical surface in a semi-automated manner for a species you’ve never seen before. But what if you’ve seen one species a lot… too much perhaps? 6/10

What if it fails though (And let's be honest, it might sometimes)? Then you edit as if it were a human brain in Freesurfer and rerun the filling and tessellation steps. 5/10

What do you need to run precon_all? First you need a T1, or an image with T1 like contrast. Then you need to provide a user defined brain mask, two hemisphere masks, a “noncortical” mask which removes anything you don’t want included, and a “subcortical” mask which fills in the subcortex. 4/10

Its design models Freesurfer, including built in modularity for separated brain extraction, segmentation, and filling and tessellation. If you've run Freesurfer for your human data then the output and interface should hopefully be a seamless experience 3/10

Precon_all simplifies the creation of cortical surfaces for comparative neuroanatomy. But how? We created a unified processing pipeline from image to cortical surface combining FSL, Connectome Workbench, Advanced Normalization Tools (ANTS), and of course… Freesurfer! 2/10

Precon_all is finally citeable! I’m relieved, pleased, thrilled and all other superlatives to present to you our preprint describing the inner workings of the precon_all pipeline for semi-automated non-human cortical surface reconstruction! www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1... 1/10

Reread the preprint yesterday and can’t help but think I prefer the original title! Congrats to the team though this is a really fantastic approach

The OxCIN Global Scholars programme offers a year of remote MRI training and collaboration for early-career researchers from the Global South. Apply by June 30th to join the 2025/26 cohort. Please repost!
www.oxcin.ox.ac.uk/about/traini...

When a Decision on Manuscript email arrives a minute before you go out to celebrate your birthday

A graphic for the Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions (MSCA), showing a historical portrait of Marie Skłodowska-Curie overlaid with an image of four young researchers walking down a hallway. The European Commission logo is in the top left. Text reads: "Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions – €404.3 million to support postdoctoral researchers”

Choose Science. Choose Europe.

A new Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions Postdoctoral Fellowships 2025 call is now open.

With a budget of €404.3 million, it will support around 1,650 researchers from Europe and beyond.

Apply by 10 September → europa.eu/!fBTMgF

I'm really loving lm notebook! You can now output podcasts about an article in multiple languages! It means I can share my work with my in-laws in spanish!

I think I want a Canadian team to win the cup this year. Rantanen may single handedly make that impossible. What a streak