Armin Lak's Avatar

Armin Lak

@laklab.bsky.social

Neuroscientist investigating neuronal bases of reward and learning. Associate Prof at Oxford University. www.laklab.org

1,416 Followers  |  822 Following  |  51 Posts  |  Joined: 22.03.2024  |  1.9278

Latest posts by laklab.bsky.social on Bluesky

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We tend to think of neurons as either excitatory or inhibitory, but some neurons chemically inhibit their downstream targets while electrically exciting their neighbors. What is gained by having an inhibitory neuron excite its neighbor?

www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...

08.12.2025 18:49 β€” πŸ‘ 67    πŸ” 22    πŸ’¬ 1    πŸ“Œ 1
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Postdoctoral Fellow / PhD Student in Systems Neuroscience - VIB The Laboratory of Cortical Information Processing | Vision to Action at NERF (www.nerf.be) invites applications for a Postdoctoral Fellow or PhD Student to work on a new research project funded by the...

Please repost widely. @vanderhaeghenp2.bsky.social and I are hiring a postdoc with expertise in sensory physiology and in vivo circuit imaging/manipulation. The project centers on human-specific brain development and SYNGAP1-related disorders. Call closing soonβ€”apply ASAP
jobs.vib.be/j/119852/pos...

25.11.2025 12:51 β€” πŸ‘ 7    πŸ” 8    πŸ’¬ 0    πŸ“Œ 2
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Corticostriatal pathways for bilateral sensorimotor functions Corticostriatal pathways are essential for a multitude of motor, sensory, cognitive, and affective functions. They are mediated by cortical pyramidal …

concise and informative review article on corticostriatal pathways in sensory process by @giladsilberberg.bsky.social et al . I find myself looking into it frequently and learn/cross check a new thing every time : www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

24.11.2025 18:04 β€” πŸ‘ 9    πŸ” 2    πŸ’¬ 0    πŸ“Œ 0
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We look forward to discussing these with you all #SfN25, #SfN2025

13.11.2025 11:20 β€” πŸ‘ 17    πŸ” 2    πŸ’¬ 0    πŸ“Œ 0
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Our lab is looking for a postdoc! We have interesting projects and cutting-edge techniques such as Neuropixels Opto, Light Beads Microscopy and more. We would be delighted to receive your application. Deadline is 25 November 2025. More info here:
www.ucl.ac.uk/cortexlab/po...

12.11.2025 15:41 β€” πŸ‘ 39    πŸ” 26    πŸ’¬ 0    πŸ“Œ 0
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and here is my (now old) gif on this (it only misses the 2p experiments):

16.10.2025 14:59 β€” πŸ‘ 3    πŸ” 0    πŸ’¬ 0    πŸ“Œ 0

Congradulations to co-1st authors, Antara Majumdar, Caitlin Ashcroft & Matthias Fritsche, our collaborators and funders

16.10.2025 14:59 β€” πŸ‘ 1    πŸ” 0    πŸ’¬ 1    πŸ“Œ 0
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Out today at Neuron, our experiments show that frontal cortical representation of economic variables is jointly determined by spatial organization and downstream
connectivity of neurons, revealing a structured, multi-scale code for economic variables. www.cell.com/neuron/fullt...

16.10.2025 14:59 β€” πŸ‘ 95    πŸ” 26    πŸ’¬ 6    πŸ“Œ 0

Congratulations! So exciting!

13.10.2025 19:06 β€” πŸ‘ 1    πŸ” 0    πŸ’¬ 1    πŸ“Œ 0
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Desensitization of opsin responses during all-optical interrogation depends on imaging parameters Significance The combination of two-photon calcium imaging and two-photon optogenetic stimulation, termed all-optical interrogation, provides spatial and temporal precision when recording and manipula...

All-optical experiments are great but @neurorussell.bsky.social found that opsin desensitization due to cross-talk between the imaging laser and the opsin causes major issues. These can be ameleorated with long inter-stimulus intervals & short imaging doses. All here: www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

12.10.2025 12:27 β€” πŸ‘ 39    πŸ” 9    πŸ’¬ 0    πŸ“Œ 0
Development of robust, single-subject markers of predictive inference for computational psychiatry

Looking for a PhD next year? Want to come and work on the next generation of OPM-MEG/EEG biomarkers in computational psychiatry?

Apply for our MRC iCase studentship with @mkflugge.bsky.social, collabs with @lilweb.bsky.social + industrial placement at P1Vital:
www.medsci.ox.ac.uk/study/gradua...

26.09.2025 10:11 β€” πŸ‘ 32    πŸ” 29    πŸ’¬ 1    πŸ“Œ 3
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A hardwired neural circuit for temporal difference learning The neurotransmitter dopamine plays a major role in learning by acting as a teaching signal to update the brain's predictions about rewards. A leading theory proposes that this process is analogous to...

Beautiful and clear results showing that temporal difference error calculation is hardwired in the dopamine/striatum mircocircuits: www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...
from @malcolmgcampbell.bsky.social and @naoshigeuchida.bsky.social

20.09.2025 11:36 β€” πŸ‘ 36    πŸ” 12    πŸ’¬ 1    πŸ“Œ 0

In our Learning Club @cmc-lab.bsky.social today (Aug 18, Thu, 2pm CET), Samuel Liebana will tell us about his paper (www.cell.com/cell/fulltex... [joint work w/ @saxelab.bsky.social & @laklab.bsky.social]. Want to attend, send an empty email to virtual-talk-link-request@cmclab.org to get the link!

18.09.2025 07:44 β€” πŸ‘ 7    πŸ” 6    πŸ’¬ 0    πŸ“Œ 0
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Concise and informative highlight on our recent paper, thanks to Seung Chan Kim, Sehwan Kim & Sang Ryong Kim. www.nature.com/articles/s41...

09.09.2025 17:23 β€” πŸ‘ 5    πŸ” 0    πŸ’¬ 0    πŸ“Œ 0

Hagai Bergman - whose celebrated work was a critical step in identifying the subthalamic nucleus as a target for deep brain stimulation in Parkinson's disease - & Josh Goldberg, both of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, helping to stop traffic (posted by Josh on X): Stop the war! Bring them home!

17.08.2025 08:16 β€” πŸ‘ 4    πŸ” 3    πŸ’¬ 1    πŸ“Œ 0
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UCL – University College London UCL is consistently ranked as one of the top ten universities in the world (QS World University Rankings 2010-2022) and is No.2 in the UK for research power (Research Excellence Framework 2021).

We are recruiting a new PI at the FIL @imagingneuroucl.bsky.social, Associate or Full Professor. This is an amazing place to do cognitive neuroscience, in the heart of London. If you or someone you know might be interested, please pass it on. #neuroskyence

www.ucl.ac.uk/work-at-ucl/...

08.08.2025 10:52 β€” πŸ‘ 58    πŸ” 69    πŸ’¬ 0    πŸ“Œ 2
Summary figure for study of psilocybin's effect on cortical network connectivity.

Summary figure for study of psilocybin's effect on cortical network connectivity.

New preprint + thread 🧡

#Psychedelics induce the formation of new synapses, but where do they connect?

Our rabies tracing study reveals that #psilocybin shifts connectivity across specific cortical networks.

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

1/12

07.08.2025 14:49 β€” πŸ‘ 78    πŸ” 29    πŸ’¬ 2    πŸ“Œ 3

Can we use what we’ve learned about cognitive maps to understand social cognition, including theory of mind?
If you’re interested in answering this question then this is a fantastic postdoc opportunity with @mkwittmann.bsky.social in collaboration with @summerfieldlab.bsky.social and my lab.

07.08.2025 16:14 β€” πŸ‘ 9    πŸ” 4    πŸ’¬ 0    πŸ“Œ 0
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Competitive integration of time and reward explains value-sensitive foraging decisions and frontal cortex ramping dynamics Bukwich and Campbell et al. show that mice integrate elapsed time and reward intake, scaled by a latent patience variable, to decide when to leave virtual β€œpatches.” Frontal cortex ramping activity ma...

Our paper on foraging is now published in Neuron! Read it here:

www.cell.com/neuron/fullt...

This project was co-led by Michael Bukwich (not on Bluesky) and me, with major contributions from all co-authors. Huge thanks to the whole team!

07.08.2025 17:35 β€” πŸ‘ 81    πŸ” 22    πŸ’¬ 2    πŸ“Œ 1
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Serotonin drives choice-independent reconfiguration of distributed neural activity Serotonin (5-HT) is a central neuromodulator which is implicated in, amongst other functions, cognitive flexibility. 5-HT is released from the dorsal raphe nucleus (DRN) throughout nearly the entire f...

🚨Pre-print alert🚨

We stimulated serotonin with optogenetics while doing large-scale Neuropixel recordings across the mouse brain. We found strong widespread modulation of neural activity, but no effect on the choices of the mouse 🐭

How is this possible? Strap in! (1/9) πŸ‘‡πŸ§΅

doi.org/10.1101/2025...

05.08.2025 12:32 β€” πŸ‘ 92    πŸ” 35    πŸ’¬ 3    πŸ“Œ 1

We're looking for a research assistant to work in our neuroscience lab at @princetonneuro.bsky.social @hhmi.org where we study learning and decision-making circuitry.

Apply here: research-princeton.icims.com/jobs/21001/r...

Pls share w/ anyone who might be interested!

05.08.2025 13:26 β€” πŸ‘ 39    πŸ” 36    πŸ’¬ 0    πŸ“Œ 1
Jobs - The University of York

2 Lecturer (Assistant Prof) positions available @yorkpsychology.bsky.social! Come join our department!

#neuroskyence #cognition #psychscisky #neurojobs

jobs.york.ac.uk/vacancy/lect...

21.07.2025 13:32 β€” πŸ‘ 81    πŸ” 86    πŸ’¬ 5    πŸ“Œ 7
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A new study led by @timothysit.bsky.social reveals that different layers of mouse V1 integrate visual and non-visual signals differently.

Activity is dominated by vision (or spontaneous fluctuations) in L2/3 and by movement in L5. This leads to different geometries.
www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

18.07.2025 16:55 β€” πŸ‘ 71    πŸ” 19    πŸ’¬ 0    πŸ“Œ 2
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Long-read RNA sequencing of transposable elements from single cells using CELLO-seq - Nature Protocols Single-cell long-read RNA sequencing enables the high-fidelity mapping of single-cell expression data from highly sequence-similar transposable elements to unique genomic loci by correcting errors fro...

Very happy to share our protocols paper for CELLO-seq. This will make single cell long read RNA-seq more accessible and provides analysis guidelines. We hope this helps the #transposon #TEsky community and folks working on #singleCell isoform and allelic #gene expression. doi.org/10.1038/s415...

16.07.2025 16:55 β€” πŸ‘ 105    πŸ” 38    πŸ’¬ 8    πŸ“Œ 1
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Synaptic plasticity of prefrontal long-range inhibition regulates cognitive flexibility While glutamatergic synaptic plasticity is believed to be a fundamental mechanism mediating learning, the behavioral significance of plasticity at cortical GABAergic synapses remains less well underst...

New work! Learning is assumed to involve synaptic plasticity, but which specific synapses change to enable higher order cognitive functions? We actually find that cognitive flexibility involves potentiation of long-range GABAergic synapses from prefrontal PV neurons: www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

30.06.2025 17:55 β€” πŸ‘ 54    πŸ” 17    πŸ’¬ 1    πŸ“Œ 0

More of a coach than a fan!

11.07.2025 19:14 β€” πŸ‘ 1    πŸ” 0    πŸ’¬ 0    πŸ“Œ 0

thanks for the shout-out!

11.07.2025 19:12 β€” πŸ‘ 1    πŸ” 0    πŸ’¬ 0    πŸ“Œ 0

Very nice review!

04.07.2025 15:16 β€” πŸ‘ 2    πŸ” 0    πŸ’¬ 0    πŸ“Œ 0

Really awesome results. Congratulations all

02.07.2025 19:24 β€” πŸ‘ 0    πŸ” 0    πŸ’¬ 0    πŸ“Œ 0
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Assistant or Associate Professor in Mammalian Neuroscience (110565-0625) at University of Warwick Start your UK & international job search for academic jobs, research jobs, science jobs and managerial jobs in leading universities and top...

Assistant Prof/Associate Prof position in Mammalian Neuroscience! πŸ‘©β€πŸ”¬πŸ‘¨β€πŸ”¬

My department is hiring! Closing on June 30th.

Please repost widely!

www.jobs.ac.uk/job/DNK944/a...

16.06.2025 14:47 β€” πŸ‘ 4    πŸ” 5    πŸ’¬ 0    πŸ“Œ 1

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