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Attention Circuits Control Lab
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HOMEPAGE

MISSION STATEMENT: WHY WE RUN THIS ATTENTION-CIRCUITS-CONTROL LAB.

We believe that every choice and course of action – flexible-and-intelligent, or
maladaptive-and-dysfunctional – has its causal origin in neuronal circuit
dynamics that can be identified and understood. Thus, we want to identify the
neuronal implementation, the algorithms, and the cellular machinery that precede
and thereby exert control over choices. We name this the search for control
processes of attention in brain circuits.




WHAT ARE CONTROL PROCESSES UNDERLYING ATTENTION IN BRAIN CIRCUITS ?

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Our lab strives to understand how neuronal circuits implement control processes
governing our attention. We aim to achieve this mission by acknowledging that
the implementation of these processes at the (local) neural microcircuit scale
will be based on canonical gating and gain control mechanisms forming so called
Dynamic Circuit Motifs (Nature Neuroscience). The implementation of these
processes at the larger scale of brain networks requires acknowledging that
there are multiple processes in the brain that coordinate every moment in time
to decide what we attend to: Some are external to the brain (a salient event),
but most are internally generated within the brain : They come from prior
experience (‘My memory suggests that X is relevant and valuable in such a
situation?), or from ‘logic and task rules‘ (‘I need to look out for X if I want
Y’), or from motivation (‘I want to see this’). We have described these multiple
sources of control in a heuristic framework of Long-Range Attention Networks:
Circuit Motifs Underlying Endogenously Controlled Stimulus Selection (2015,
Trends in Neurosciences). Other excellent reviews about these topics have
recently been published by Shenhav, Botvinick and Cohen on the neuronal
computations underlying the ‘Expected Value of Control’, by Prof. J Gottlieb
about Attention, Learning, and the Value of Information, by Baluch and Itti
surveying the functional architecture of the Mechanisms of top-down attention.

An important insight that guides our research is that Controlâ depends heavily
on coordination – In the brain, this coordination is achieved without central
controller. For some cool insights about Control without central coordination
see Kumar’s TED talks.

HOW DO WE STUDY ATTENTION AND CONTROL IN BRAIN CIRCUITS ?

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We measure and model behaviour and brain activity with multiple approaches –
please see our Research overview. Here some review manuscripts on these topics
from our lab:

 * Womelsdorf T, Everling S (2015) Long-Range Attention Networks: Circuit Motifs
   Underlying Endogenously Controlled Stimulus Selection. Trends in
   Neurosciences. 38:11 682-700 pdf (or via RG).
 * Womelsdorf T, Valiante TA, Sahin NT, Miller KJ, Tiesinga P (2014) Dynamic
   circuit motifs underlying rhythmic gain control, gating and integration.
   Nature Neuroscience. 17: 1031–1039. pdf
 * Womelsdorf T., Landau A.N., Fries P. (2014) Attentional Selection through
   Rhythmic Synchronization at Multiple Frequencies. In: The Cognitive
   Neurosciences V. Editor: M. Gazzaniga. MIT Press, Cambridge MA, USA.
 * Womelsdorf, T., Vinck, M., Leung, S. & Everling, S. (2010) Selective theta
   synchronization of choice relevant information subserves goal-directed
   behavior. Frontiers in Human Neuroscience. 107(11): 5248-53.
 * Womelsdorf, T. & Fries, P. (2007) The role of neuronal synchronization in
   selective attention. Current Opinion in Neurobiology. 17, 154-160.

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– NEWS –

 * January 23, 2023
   
   
   
   ACETYLCHOLINERGIC DRUG ENHANCES ATTENTION AT DIFFERENT DOSE AS COGNITIVE
   FLEXIBILITY
   
   
   
   Acetylcholinergic Drug enhances attention at different dose as cognitive
   flexibilityWe tested how a cholinergic drug that is used to treat symptoms of
   dementia (donepezil, Arizept) affects cognitive abilities across multiple
   domains in monkeys. We found that donepezil showed stunning improvements of
   attentional filtering (less distraction) during visual search but at a
   different dose at it […]
   
   

 * September 15, 2022
   
   
   
   ACC CAUSALLY SUPPORTS LEARNING -DIFFICULT- ATTENTION SETS
   
   
   
   We used focused ultrasound (FUS) sonication of the anterior cingualte and
   striatum to disrupt local processing during learning. FUS in ACC slowed down
   learning of atetntion sets – but only when the attentional demands were high
   and the task included the risk of loosing already attaiuned reward tokens.
   Under these cognitive and motivaitonally challenging conditions […]
   
   

 * June 10, 2022
   
   
   
   ADAPTIVE LEARNING NEEDS ATTENTION, META-LEARNING AND WORKING MEMORY
   
   
   
   We tested which model mechanisms best explain how six animals learn attention
   sets and found a common set of most-important behavioral mechanisms that
   account for learning success.When learning attention sets is easy value based
   reinforcement learning and working memory are powerful, but when learning
   problems are more complex learning is more efficient with attention and […]
   
   

 * August 26, 2021
   
   
   
   A NOVEL MONKEY KIOSK: COGNITIVE ENRICHMENT AND COGNITIVE ASSESSMENT
   
   
   
   We now published the hardware and software design for a novel Monkey Kiosk
   Station that provides cognitive enrichment and the ability to assess
   cognition with cage-based touchscreen tasks. The paper and its appendix with
   the technical details are available here.
   
   

 * July 3, 2021
   
   
   
   INTERNEURON-SPECIFIC GAMMA SYNCHRONY INDEXES UNCERTAINTY RESOLUTION
   
   
   
   Our new paper in eLife shows that a subclass of fast spiking interneurons in
   prefrontal and anterior cingulate cortex gamma synchronizes when uncertainty
   about cues and outcomes is resolved. This finding was possible by classifying
   narrow spiking neurons into fast and non-fast spiking classes and correlating
   their firing and spike-LFP synchrony during processing of attention […]
   
   

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