“i urge you not to let chains silence you, nor borders restrain you. be bridges toward the liberation of the land and its people, until the sun of dignity and freedom rises over our stolen homeland.” rest in power ya anas fa anta shareef tshrfna ya batal

Barely an hour ago, Palestinian journalist Anas Al-Sharif warned us all: “If this madness doesn’t end, Gaza will be reduced to ruins, its people’s voices silenced, their faces erased — and history will remember you as silent witnesses to a genocide you chose not to stop.” Israel just killed him.

thrilled to share my first published paper! across 3 behavioral experiments, we find that although encoding and prediction depend on distinct and competitive computational mechanisms, the success of one in behavior can increase the likelihood of success for the other.

This project unfolded in parallel with one led by Jiawen Huang & @chrisbaldassano.bsky.social. They also found that successful prediction enhances encoding, in a different task with different measures. Our papers were published at the same time in the same journal, purely coincidentally!

I am so proud of co-first authors Craig Poskanzer & Hannah Tarder-Stoll for seeing this project through. It was a challenging, puzzling, and exciting process and we learned a lot along the way. Also many thanks to Raheema Javid & Edoardo Spolaore for help on experimental design and data collection!

Successful prediction of the future enhances encoding of the present. I am so delighted that this work found a wonderful home at Open Mind. The peer review journey was a rollercoaster but it *greatly* improved the paper. direct.mit.edu/opmi/article...

🧠 Paper out! We investigated how hippocampal and cortical ripples support memory during movie watching. We found that: 🎬 Hippocampal ripples mark event boundaries 🧩 Cortical ripples predict later recall Ripples may help transform real-life experiences into lasting memories! rdcu.be/eui9l

If you, like me, are confused about the relationship of the "Big Beautiful Bill" to the 2025-2026 Federal budget and its relevance to science funding and other issues, here is a GREAT explainer from my friend Kevin Wilson 🧪@ascbiology.bsky.social

When we anticipate the future, the brain shows graded and bidirectional representations of the future and the past. The scale of these representations increases systematically from lower- to higher-order regions. Proud of this work led by Hannah Tarder-Stoll, a collaboration with Chris Baldassano!

Big thank you to Pakistan Society of Basic & Applied Neuroscience for allowing me to present virtually when a last minute disruption prevented me from traveling to Lahore for their 10th Annual Neuroscience Conference! Here’s to making neuro more accessible to all! 🧠

first time presenting at sfn!

amazed at how fast a four hour poster session can fly by when you’re having fun!

Does encoding the present compete with predicting the future? Across 3 studies, we find that encoding and prediction are coupled, not competitive! Proud of co-first authors Craig Poskanzer & Hannah Tarder-Stoll, along w/ @raheemajavid.bsky.social & Edoardo Spolaore! osf.io/preprints/ps...

Almost exactly how I teach about titles. Something catchy or fun implying you can write: The effect of the Independent Variable on the Dependent Variable

Steve Silberman's empathic storytelling changed how society—and researchers—view autistic people. More on his legacy: www.thetransmitter.org/spectrum/the... By @ejwillingham.bsky.social

The link for ordering 4 free COVID tests is now LIVE. Do it NOW! Order here: covidtests.gov

One thing I find depressing / unintentionally funny about the replication crisis in psychology is there’s all this high-level drama about retractions & fraud, then you look at the original study & it’s like… “Thinking about God made undergrads (N=28) wash their hands 0.8 seconds longer (p=0.04)”.

Time for another what-is-AI thread, because there’s a lot of confusion, seeded on purpose by shitty vulture capitalists trying to sell stuff. AI is a legit branch of computer science with a LOT of different approaches & addressing MANY different types of problems.

Does environment affect how children from diverse backgrounds perform on tests of executive function? Ka Ip went to the Minnesota State Fair to find out. By @avaskham.bsky.social www.thetransmitter.org/executive-fu...

why is there no seahorse emoji? i’m stuck between: 🌊🐎 or just using 🐬/🦐 cuz it kinda resembles the shape of the hippocampus lol

#neuroskyence This book is available in ebook format at a discounted price in November. www.amazon.co.uk/Understandin...

@oliviagieger.bsky.social sits down with Pei Yuan Zhang to discuss life outside the lab, which for Zhang includes filming documentaries that challenge her love of data and order. www.thetransmitter.org/craft-and-ca...

Day 1 of #SciFest2024 🧠✅ amazing talks from daphna shohamy, franck polleux, amir lawen and more highlight of the day: learning about siamese fighting fish 🐟

📍 Zuckerman Institute Happening now: Poster session @ ZI SciFest

Is expecting something the same as attending to something? Very interesting study on the differences and commonalities between preparing for something probable and preparing for something relevant by Peñalver and Ruz and colleagues at CIMCYC. www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1... 🧠🟦

Go back in time (and seasons!) and watch my @cogscisociety.bsky.social keynote in Rotterdam this summer. If you squint hard you can feel the sun on your face! underline.io/events/465/s...

while i don't think anyone would argue Disney's Inside Out is an *accurate* representation of memory, emotions or imagination, i do think it makes for a great introduction to an SEL lesson on metacognition-- plus it's always an instant class favorite! #cogsci #psychscisky #edusky #cognition

This remarkable tree, Dracaena cinnabari, is native to Yemen & specifically islands off the coast of Yemen, the 'Socotra Archipelago'. The shape is an adaptation to desert ecology: minimizing evaporation & shading seedlings. But their most exceptional quality: they bleed 'dragon's blood'.

accessibility tip for my fellow 🧠 scientists 🧪 consider minimizing or even eliminating abbreviations from your write-ups & presentations! maintaining these unnecessarily increases working memory load, your audience is already engaging ample cognitive effort to follow along #cogsci #neurodiversity

I had the honor of writing about the life and legacy of Larry Young, who pioneered work on the biochemistry of social bonds, built bridges in the field and brought oxytocin research to the mainstream. My latest for @thetransmitter.bsky.social: #neuroskyence #neuroscience

that’s a wrap on CNS2024! 🇨🇦 had the best time with the most amazing group of people that i get to work with! @huangjiawen.bsky.social @hartwakeland.bsky.social @craig_poskanzer

If you're interested in doing outstanding cognitive neuroscience in memory and attention with an amazing PI, get in touch with Mariam now! Creative and rigorous research and a brilliant person to work with.

This is one of the best researchers in the world, at any level, in cognitive neuroscience and she is recruiting - an opportunity not to be missed!!

Looking forward to our CNS 2024 symposium: Hippocampal predictions link memory and perception! Covering the latest evidence from neuroimaging, psychophyics, and computational modeling. With talks by Morgan Barense, Dhairyya Singh, Oliver Warrington, @mariamaly.bsky.social, and Oded Bein. 🧠🟦🧠💻

Are you interested in memory, attention, and prediction? Well, we have data for you! Come check out our talks and posters #CNS2024! If you're not going to the meeting, don't worry – we'll upload our posters to our website soon after. Hope to see you in Toronto! #PsychSciSky #neuroskyence

Finally, I'm moving *this summer* and will be looking to recruit! Reach out if you are interested in joining the lab. Learn more about us here: www.alylab.org (3/3)

I am so grateful to those who showed me kindness, respect, grace, patience, and support this past year – including my social media community. When I doubted myself, you showed me that I'm valued. I'll always remember your support and will pay it back and forward. (2/3)

When I moved to California for my PhD, I felt like I was home. I never wanted to leave. So I am *delighted* to be going back – to join the faculty at UC Berkeley's psych department! Thanks to my amazing lab, mentors, letter writers, friends, & partner for helping me land a dream job ❤️ 🔆 (1/3)

The Transmitter (@thetransmitter.bsky.social) has launched as a new publication for neuroscientists! I wrote about being a neuroscience researcher in a world on fire and what we need to do. #neuroskyence #PsychSciSky #compneuro #NeuroAI #MLSky www.thetransmitter.org/craft-and-ca...

first ever poster presentation at ABRCMS ✅ #alhumdulillah

What makes an image memorable? Images that are highly arousing and moderately negative are more memorable. But the arousal/valence of an image explains surprisingly little variance in memorability! So proud of the amazing @hartwakeland.bsky.social for leading this work! #PsychSciSky

Deosai National Park, Pakistan

How do we resolve competition between memories to behave adaptively? Hippocampal differentiation of competing memories predicts the precision of preparatory coding in visual cortex during memory-guided attention Excited to share this work by the inimitable Serra Favila! #neuroskyence #PsychSciSky

My latest career advice: Get ready to fail. Learn to accept failure with a bit of grace (and give grace to others when they fail). Get better at learning from your failures. Figure out what you are willing to fail at and what you aren’t. That’s about 90% of my job, and more generally my life.