Maximilian E. Kirschhock
@crowbrain.bsky.social
Postdoc @ Weizmann Institute on bats' navigation | PhD @ Uni Tübingen, Germany on numerical cognition in crows | birds/bats, brains & behavior
![Comic. [Small maze on a table. A person in a labcoat holds a mouse above it. Another person with shoulder-length hair, also in a labcoat, stands next to him behind a podium.] [caption] Research breakthrough: After over a century of trials, scientists have finally found a mouse that can solve the maze.](https://cdn.bsky.app/img/feed_thumbnail/plain/did:plc:cz73r7iyiqn26upot4jtjdhk/bafkreih36uh4b6ksbmu22stjai7sl7ao6ivaqckavvdl7eiajfvpzdedsq)
Ever wonder how your brain navigates the real world? 🧠 Most spatial navigation studies use flat, 2D mazes. But the real world is hilly, irregular, and bumpy! ⛰️ Our new paper in #ScienceAdvances asked a simple question: How does the brain map uneven terrain? 📄 doi.org/10.1126/scia... 🧵👇️️️ 1/
Striking parallels between #macaques and #crows, in line with a Bayesian integration mechanism. Great to see more direct comparisons emphasizing differences in reaction-time signatures, from Tobias Machts and @crowbrain.bsky.social at Nieder Lab: www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...
Reaction-time signatures reveal divergent cognitive strategies underlying numerical decisions in monkeys and crows
Non-symbolic numerical competence, supported by the approximate number system (ANS), is widespread across animals, yet it remains unclear whether simi…
sciencedirect.com
How do social netowrks form and evolve? We looked at a bunch of bats to explore this! doi.org/10.1111/nyas...
Our new paper comparing #crows and #monkeys on their cognitive strategies solving a numerical task has been accepted and published in @cognitionjournal.bsky.social last week! Very excited to see this project through 🤩 Check out the thread below 👇
Cognition@cognitionjournal.bsky.social · 5mo agoMonkeys solve an abstract-category delayed match-to-sample task through slow, capacity-limited, sequential checking, whereas crows rely on fast, parallel, anticipatory processing with reduced working-memory load. www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...
1/n We have discovered that bees can keep track of time duration! Bees can discriminate long 🟡🟡 vs short🟡 flashes, a bit like the "dash" and "dot" of the Morse code. Check our new paper royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/... and videoclip youtu.be/hsGxU65OMQk?... @preparedmindslab.bsky.social
Neuroscience projects last several years, and you are usually a bit jaded by the time you wrap it up. Not this one– spending several months on an island in the middle of nowhere, away from all the craziness of the world reminds you how beautiful the world really is. www.youtube.com/watch?v=46sv...
Bat Island: The New Era of Science
YouTube video by Weizmann Institute of Science
youtube.com
The work with bats on barren, 7-acre Latham Island was Nachum Ulanovsky’s most complex undertaking yet. By @claudia-lopez.bsky.social #neuroskyence www.thetransmitter.org/neuroetholog...
I’m just as excited that @shakedpa.bsky.social’s paper is finally out! Recording from bats flying freely outdoors felt like science fiction at first — now it’s real. Projects like this are why I joined Nachum Ulanovsky’s lab. So cool! So proud! This is a new era of science 🧪 Check out Shaked's 🧵👇
Shaked Palgi@shakedpa.bsky.social · 10mo agoI am excited to share my PhD work on head-direction cells recorded in the wild, now published in @science.org, where we recorded neurons in bats flying outdoors on an island. doi.org/10.1126/sci... With @ray-neuro.bsky.social, Shir Maimon, Liora Las, Nachum Ulanovsky and many others
Our paper on #number discrimination in #Danionella is out #zebrafish #numbersense #number_sense #number @mirkuz12 #scott_fraser cell.com/iscience/ful...
Numerical discrimination in Danionella
The transparent teleost Danionella cerebrum offers unique advantages for neuroscience research, including small size, lifelong cranial transparency, and a simplified brain. Despite its suitability for...
cell.com
New paper on precise tool use learning in carrion crows @currentbiology.bsky.social. We show that—like New Caledonian crows—expert carrion crows pay close attention to the working end of their tool, suggesting tool integration into their peripersonal space. 🧵 & vids! 👇 www.cell.com/current-biol...
I'm delighted to share that, together with @crowbrain.bsky.social our paper on time estimation in crows is now published in @natcomms.nature.com We found that crows not only keep track of time, but individual neurons prefer different time durations 🐦⏱️🧠 Check it out: www.nature.com/articles/s41...
A neuronal correlate for time interval estimation in the crow’s telencephalon - Nature Communications
It is unknown how birds estimate time using brains organized differently from mammals. Here, the authors show that neurons in the crow NCL encode duration categories, supporting abstract, cue-independ...
nature.com
I'm usually not very active here, but good news: Together with @milliejohnston.bsky.social, our paper on time estimation in #crows got published in @natcomms.nature.com today! We found crow neurons track time like a stopwatch — without a cortex! 🐦⏱️🧠 #SciComm #Science 🧪 www.nature.com/articles/s41...
A neuronal correlate for time interval estimation in the crow’s telencephalon - Nature Communications
It is unknown how birds estimate time using brains organized differently from mammals. Here, the authors show that neurons in the crow NCL encode duration categories, supporting abstract, cue-independ...
nature.com
Without urgent action, a species that helps hold rainforests together might be gone for good. 👉 Read the full story: theconversation.com/yes-spe...
We know how visual objects influence spatial tuning in the hippocampus. A new study from @batwoman123.bsky.social shows that auditory objects can be egocentrically or allocentrically encoded in the hippocampus of echolocating bats 🦇. www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti... @currentbiology.bsky.social
Auditory object representation in the bat hippocampus
Cognitive maps enable the flexible selection of navigation paths. Acoustic cognitive maps, constructed from the spatial layout of sonar auditory objec…
sciencedirect.com
The new issue is out👉https://www.cell.com/cell/current On the cover, Eliav et al. reveal that hippocampal replays in bats flying in very large, naturalistic environments were highly fragmented and short, depicting trajectories covering only a small portion of the environment size.
🚨New in @cellpress.bsky.social We discovered that hippocampal replays in natural-scale environments are highly fragmented, not full-length. doi.org/10.1016/j.ce... 👇🧵
I second everything @shakedpa.bsky.social said (though I'm also biased of course 😃) @mitpress.bsky.social #neuroscience #naturalneuroscience #science 🧪
Shaked Palgi@shakedpa.bsky.social · last yr.Since Nachum Ulanovsky is not on social media, I'm on PR duty today ;) Nachum wrote a book titled "Natural Neuroscience"! I am biased of course, but I think it's very relevant to whoever cares about the brain and about how we study it, from undergrads to professors. mitpress.mit.edu/978026204499...
Nature Communications Allocentric and egocentric spatial representations coexist in rodent medial entorhinal cortex www.nature.com/articles/s41...
Allocentric and egocentric spatial representations coexist in rodent medial entorhinal cortex - Nature Communications
Successful navigation relies on reciprocal transformation between different reference frames. Here the authors report egocentric representations of the angle and distance to the boundaries and center ...
nature.com
Happy head direction cell day y’all! On this day, 41 years ago, Jim Ranck recorded the first “HD cell” in his Brooklyn lab in 1984. Jim shared the news with the world at SFN that year, showing a video of the cell’s firing on a TV he somehow acquired and brought to his poster… (1/3)
We value things differently depending on the situation. A fascinating paper shows that the hippocampus feeds contextual information to the prefrontal cortex by altering theta wave phase alignment, enabling the PFC to adjust value judgments accordingly. www.nature.com/articles/s41... #neuroscience
Context-dependent decision-making in the primate hippocampal–prefrontal circuit - Nature Neuroscience
The brain uses different valuation schemes across contexts. Elston and Wallis show this is supported by hippocampal encoding of context that is broadcast to prefrontal value subcircuits via theta sync...
nature.com
New paper today! We show that homing pigeons do not have an enlarged hippocampus when compared with other pigeons. They do, however, have higher hippocampal neuronal density and this could be important for navigation. #neuroskyence #ornithology #anatomy link.springer.com/article/10.1...
The quantitative anatomy of the hippocampal formation in homing pigeons and other pigeon breeds: implications for spatial cognition - Brain Structure and Function
Artificial selection for specific behavioural and physical traits in domesticated animals has resulted in a wide variety of breeds. One of the most widely recognized examples of behavioural selection ...
link.springer.com
I trained #crows to (kind of) "count" up to 5. Different neurons take over every step of the counting process, from recognising the #number to producing it. 🧪🧠🐦⬛ www.nature.com/articles/s41...
Number selective sensorimotor neurons in the crow translate perceived numerosity into number of actions - Nature Communications
Translating a perceived number into a matching number of self-generated actions is key in numerical reasoning. Here, the authors report sensorimotor neurons in the crow telencephalon that signaled the...
nature.com
David Shiffman, Ph.D. 🦈@whysharksmatter.bsky.social · 2y agoScience friends 🧪🌎🦑, @altmetric.com tracks Bluesky posts now! Quote or reply to this post with a link to the paper you’re best known for or most proud of, and a brief plain-language summary of what you found and why it matters! Let’s fill Bluesky with SCIENCE!
#NeuralRecordings in butterflies?! Very excited to give this a read (& and a share) 🤩
Jerome Beetz@beetzjerome.bsky.social · 2y agoWith neural/tetrode recordings from behaving monarch butterflies, we revealed how goal and compass information are processed in the insect brain. www.nature.com/articles/s41...
Our work on neural recordings in flying bats on an island. @shakedpa.bsky.social is a great speaker and it's fun work! 🦇🧠🧪
Zebrafish can sense numbers! 🔢🐟 In my first preLight post, I have highlighted the work from Peter Luu & colleagues revealing early emergence of number-selective neurons in larval zebrafish. #preprint #companyofbiologist #zebrafishologist Take a look! ⬇️ 👀 prelights.biologists.com/highlights/n...
Neural Basis of Number Sense in Larval Zebrafish - preLights
Zebrafish can sense numbers! This preprint reveals early emergence of number-selective neurons in larval zebrafish
prelights.biologists.com