hkl @hkl@qoto.org

Why birds are smart
https://www.cell.com/trends/cognitive-sciences/fulltext/S1364-6613(23)00281-4
#neuroscience

A breathtaking early morning timelapse of Comet NEOWISE rising over the Adriatic Sea behind undulating noctilucent clouds captured in 2022.

Video credit: Paolo Girotti / CC BY

Vermillion Flycatcher, 11-21-23
#birds #birdphotography #silentsunday

Spectacular timelapse of the Milky Way galaxy and a phenomenon known as airglow seen from the International Space Station.

Watch the full video in 4K on Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8wMbzylZxEI

Related is also the haptic counterpart: Visual experience is not necessary for the development of face-selectivity in the lateral fusiform gyrus https://www.pnas.org/doi/full/10.1073/pnas.2004607117 by @apurvaratan @echodislocation @NancyKanwisher et al.

Greater Spotted Woodpecker

The great spotted woodpecker is a medium-sized woodpecker. It nests in holes that it excavates in trees in broadleaved woodlands, large parks and gardens. It has a distinctive, bouncing flight, but is mostly likely to be heard, rather than seen, as it 'drums' away at a tree trunk during its breeding displays. [Wildlife trust]

#nature #birds #Wildlife #photography #NaturePhotography #BirdPhotography #BirdsOfMastodon #UK

Fast Hebbian plasticity and working memory
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.conb.2023.102809
#neuroscience

Ruby Crowned Kinglet.

they are so small and hard to get a photo.
#birdphotography #naturephotography #wildlifephotography #photography

The strain on scientific publishing

https://arxiv.org/abs/2309.15884

#academia #AcademicChatter #PublishOrPerish

Oooooooooooh! How perfect for #TongueOutTuesday This is the leucistic raven that has been spotted by about a thousand people in the Anchorage area. Photo by Michelle Hanson.
#Alaska #AlaskaWildlife #BirdsOfAlaska #WhiteRaven

When the conference doors close, these scientists rock out.

A Pavlov’s Dogz show has become tradition at the annual Society for Neuroscience meeting.
https://www.thetransmitter.org/community/when-the-conference-doors-close-these-scientists-rock-out/
#neuroscience

YES!
This is precisely what every university (and scholarly society!!) should be doing: have their own instance and drop X like a hot potato:

"an instance has been created [... ] on university servers, which is open to the university's organizational units. The active use of X will be significantly reduced."

https://www.uibk.ac.at/en/newsroom/2023/university-of-innsbruck-focuses-on-mastodon/

We detail all the arguments about precisely why that must happen here:
https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/rsos.230207

"In fact, research indicates that, in labs where postdocs are more engaged, PhD students can be 4 times as likely to have positive skill development; mentoring by principal investigators had no discernible statistical effect on the same variable"

https://journals.plos.org/plosbiology/article?id=10.1371/journal.pbio.3002349

“Insulin belongs to the world, not to me.” — Dr. Frederick Banting wanted insulin to be within reach of everyone who needed it.

But every single House Republican voted against capping the price of insulin at $35/month for the 8.4 million Americans who need it.

Humans are not rodents: Activity in primate visual cortex is minimally driven by spontaneous movements https://www.nature.com/articles/s41593-023-01459-5 Now what are good scientific questions to ask when probing adaptation to visual-to-auditory sensory substitution? #neuroscience

Long-term availability of The vOICe is guaranteed https://web.archive.org/web/20211225143619/https://www.seeingwithsound.com/webvoice/webvoice.htm Internet Archive; #bionic #ethics

Neural correlates of theory of mind reasoning in congenitally blind children https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1878929323000907 "data suggest that vision facilitates, but is not necessary for, ToM development"

Cool story: xenografting of human #neurons into mouse #Alzheimers model resulted in their death by #necroptosis. This process involves #lncRNA MEG3, possibly via TNF inflammatory signaling. This study revealed human-specific vulnerability in AD.
#neuroscience
https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.abp9556

Pretty interesting new data on GluA1 homomers from Ingo Greger’s lab. Distinct structural dynamics of this special subclass, compared to other AMPAR, are examined at multiple levels, from CryoEM to synaptic responses. #glutsmate #ionchannels #synapses https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-023-06528-0