#ECRO2026 took the girls to Paris and left the boys at home. An acceptable time was had in a mediocrely pretty city, eating a cow’s weight of passable cheese, listening to great science and catching up with old friends. Also managed to sneak Dolly Parton ✨ into my talk, enough Proust already

Just wrapped up my 1st ECRO meeting! 🇫🇷🥐 I met so many amazing people, swapped stories, ideas and made new friends. From hallway chats to culinary experiences, I learned more in a few days than I expected. ✨ Already quite excited for the next one! 🇸🇪👑🛳️

Rich pickings today on the department free stuff table. Almost archeological, I would say. Cambridge people, be quick and snap it up before it's gone!

Two months ago I graduated as Dr McWhinnie following the most amazing five years studying dopamine in olfaction with @elisagalliano.bsky.social at @pdncambridge.bsky.social It's been a blast, but a new life beckons..........✏️✏️✏️............

Had a lot of fun writing this primer with @elisagalliano.bsky.social! If you've ever been transported back to childhood by the smell of a familiar scent, you might enjoy this. We unpack a new study revealing how neurons generated around birth help encode these lifelong olfactory memories.

PLOS Biology@plosbiology.org · 3mo ago

How do smells linked to joyful childhood events trigger vivid adulthood memories? @elisagalliano.bsky.social @chloeg-neuro.bsky.social explore a @plosbiology.org study showing that neurons generated around birth help encode these olfactory memories 🧪 Paper: plos.io/3TmixuJ Primer: plos.io/4wKLyP4

Why are childhood smells so good at ambushing you decades later? The Mandairon lab has the answers in @plosbiology.org ⤵️ @chloeg-neuro.bsky.social and I wrote the accompanying primer featuring literary detours and a baby mouse having a lovely day at the beach, because why not 🐭🏖️ shorturl.at/hSEcq

PLOS Biology@plosbiology.org · 3mo ago

How do #olfactory early-life memories exert privileged influence on long-term #memory & #brain structure? This study shows that early experiences with pleasant #odorants create persistent memories supported by neonatal #neurons & dynamic brain connectivity @plosbiology.org 🧪 plos.io/3TmixuJ

After almost 5 yrs, @ailiemcwhinnie.bsky.social hang up up her patch pipettes. Devastated to see her fly the nest but bursting with pride as she takes up a Maria Leptin @embo.org Science journalism Fellowship hosted by @science.org 🤯 World, get ready for the unleashing of her insane comms talent 🚀

Experimental conditions today: heatwave + electricity blackout across half the city ⚫🥵 Panel A lab: dark, silent, slowly turning into a sensory deprivation chamber besides for heath sensing Panel B nearby pub: own generator, AC, WiFi, cold beers. Choosing was really not that hard 🍻

Huge congratulations to Dr Gadiwalla @neurosana.bsky.social for "defending" her thesis in Iceland on Monday. I was hoping for Viking swords & saga-level battle, but alas only intellectual sparring ⚔️🇮🇸 Thanks to superb "opponents" @neurovenki.bsky.social @inchinn.bsky.social & main supervisor Petur🥂

In the middle of the hottest may ever, this also happened last week 🥵🤩 Congratulations Dr McWhinnie, you made it out of PhD jail *and* you survived 30°C in synthetic gown and hood full regalia 💯💪 @ailiemcwhinnie.bsky.social

A pretty Cambridge college, three meals a day, bursaries (and otherwise heavily subsidised), a stellar organising team (@chloeg-neuro.bsky.social 💯✨), and OPEN SCIENCE theory and practice. If you don’t apply, you’re either a fool, a predatory journal owner, or (fair enough) on holiday⤵️

Cambridge Open Lab@cam-openlab.bsky.social · 5mo ago

📢 Applications are open for the “Open Science in Practice” Summer School! A week of talks + hands-on workshops on open science, electronics, 3D printing, and DeepLabCut for students & early-career researchers. 📍Homerton College, Cambridge (UK) 📅 Apply by 9 June 2026 🔗https://cambridgeopenlab.org/

📢 Applications are open for the “Open Science in Practice” Summer School! A week of talks + hands-on workshops on open science, electronics, 3D printing, and DeepLabCut for students & early-career researchers. 📍Homerton College, Cambridge (UK) 📅 Apply by 9 June 2026 🔗https://cambridgeopenlab.org/

Sniffing Out Distance: How the Brain Tracks Odor Dynamics 🧠 🧪🧬 #AcademicSky #higherEd. #Olfaction #Neuroscience www.mcb.harvard.edu/department/n... @luxorboero.bsky.social @josephdzak.bsky.social @paulmasset.bsky.social @siddjakes.bsky.social @neurovenki.bsky.social @harvardbrainsci.bsky.social

Sniffing Out Distance: How the Brain Tracks Odor Dynamics - Harvard University - Department of Molecular & Cellular Biology

A dog unearths a bone buried months ago. A moth flies across a forest toward an orchard. A person opens container after container in the fridge, trying to […]

mcb.harvard.edu

Excited to see our paper describing a stereotyped receptor map for smell (led by @davidhbrann.bsky.social ) out in the world! See below for short thread with open access link to paper www.nytimes.com/2026/04/29/s...

Scientists Unveil ‘Long Lost’ Map for Smell

nytimes.com

Berlin is always a treat, but this time even more so thanks to the top-notch hosting from @liviadehoz.bsky.social and her lab 💯 So much incredible neuroscience, art, food… but the coolest thing had to be hearing Danionella vocalisations, courtesy of @benjulab.bsky.social 🐟🎙️

Yesterday was @camneuro.bsky.social annual meeting and after a day full of science this is how they fed us. An no, not an April Fools joke or AI generated, just your "standard conference dinner" at Queens’ College because… Cambridge 😳 Back to tea room lunches now, dreaming of our Cinderella night 🏰

Pablo's @neuropablo.bsky.social data blitz talk was worth delaying lunch for at the Cambridge Neuroscience Annual Meeting! Chapeau to him and his lab supervisor Chloe 🎩🔥 @camneuro.bsky.social @chloeg-neuro.bsky.social

Check out our latest paper - In neural networks with inhibitory feedback, local homeostatic adaptation can conflict with adaptation at the network level doi.org/10.1113/JP29...

Conflicting adaptations in an inhibitory feedback circuit

Abstract figure legend We studied activity-dependent adaptation in the fruit fly Drosophila’s memory centre, the mushroom body. Here, excitatory Kenyon cells (KCs) receive feedback inhibition from th...

doi.org

Southbank with @fim.bsky.social, feeling daft because we sort of got lost in our old stomping ground, but also like the last 10+years did not happen... Bit of art, bit of coffee at Monmouth, and a proper chin wag: living life like it's 2014!

Finally got around to updating the website with some rather important news: @ailiemcwhinnie.bsky.social passed her PhD viva with flying colours, and @annelisepaupiah.bsky.social has joined as a postdoc ✨ Not used to such speedy changes, things in Cambridge normally require a few centuries to move 😁

Spent the last couple of days in Rotterdam 🇳🇱 revisiting my villain origin story 😈🧠 Funny how the big things have changed over the last decade, the small ones in the lab absolutely haven’t, en de mensen zijn nog steeds mijn andere familie

Brief respite from Cambridge’s aggressively pretty medieval stones

First commute of the year: snow, river, swan. Adequate.

Hello 2026 👋 Please be good 👍

From our lab to yours, happy holidays and best wishes for a great start of 2026 🎄🎆✨ @chloeg-neuro.bsky.social @connordoyle.bsky.social @harinw.bsky.social @edinagulacsi.bsky.social @neurosana.bsky.social @ailiemcwhinnie.bsky.social @neuropablo.bsky.social @tess-stanley.bsky.social

Cambridge folks, last 2025 NeuroTalk 🧠🍻 Shameless lab nepotism, with @ailiemcwhinnie.bsky.social inviting @harinw.bsky.social to give a xmas-themed talk🎄 He’s already showing a shocking lack of talent with this boring, poorly written abstract, clearly only invited because he knows the right people 😉

CamBRAIN | The Cambridge Neuroscience Society@cambraincns.bsky.social · 10mo ago

Join us at our ✨CHRISTMAS ✨ Neurotalks next week to hear about the neuroscience of the nostalgia of Christmas! And since its Christmas, there will be wine on us 🍾 More about @harinw.bsky.social and @kasiamojescik.bsky.social's talks below ⬇️ 📆Tues 9 December 🕐7pm-9pm 🗺️Cambridge Tap

Turns out that when you have great students, the biggest obstacle to giving PhD theses feedback isn't the content, or the synchronized deadlines. It's the feline co-supervisor who insists in contributing right to the bitter end 📖🐈‍⬛😬 @neurosana.bsky.social @ailiemcwhinnie.bsky.social

Navigate the rise and fall of research topics over five decades using The Transmitter's interactive map, which is based on a semantic analysis of nearly 350,000 abstracts in leading neuroscience journals. Explore more: www.thetransmitter.org/publishing/p... #neuroskyence #StateOfNeuroscience

Putting 50 years of neuroscience on the map

Navigate the rise and fall of research topics over five decades using our interactive map, which is based on a semantic analysis of nearly 350,000 abstracts.

thetransmitter.org

Massive FOMo seeing the posts of people heading to #SfN2025, all that beach...ehm.. science I’m missing 😭 If you’re there, go say hi to the brilliant Bruno Pilcher and the INSS crew, who just built my lab a custom multiphoton microscope with a spatial light modulator that is pure chef’s kiss 👨‍🍳💋✨

Bruno Pichler@brunopichler.bsky.social · 11mo ago

Independent NeuroScience Services INSS was registered as a company on 14th November 2016, which means it's our 9th birthday today! As a birthday present we've treated ourselves to an SfN exhibitor booth for the first time ever. Come and say hello at Booth #3327

New @pnas.org paper led by my brilliant colleague & mentor Sue Jones 🎉 Estrogen drives plasticity in kisspeptin neurons during a developmental critical window, shaping how the female brain regulates fertility. Congrats to Yuanxin + Leonie & Lauren, happy to have played a tiny part shorturl.at/bItti