Event
IAI Colloquia Series at ISR: Timothy Horiuchi, "Neural Models of 3D Spatial Orientation"
Wednesday, October 3, 2012
4:00 p.m.
1146 A.V. Williams Building
Pam White
301 405 6615
pwhite@umd.edu
http://www.isr.umd.edu/events/ISR_Colloquia_Series/index.htm
Intelligent Automation, Inc. Colloquia Series
@ The Institute for Systems Research
Neural Models of 3D Spatial Orientation in Echolocating Bats
| video |
Associate Professor Timothy Horiuchi
Institute for Systems Research
and Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering
Abstract
The areas of the mammalian brain selectively involved in spatial memory of the environment (e.g., hippocampus) have been heavily studied primarily in rats. Most prominently, 'place cells', 'grid cells', and 'head-direction cells' have been discovered that appear to maintain and update an animal's sense of location in the environment. Nearly all of these experiments have been performed in 2D environments, raising the question of what will be found in a flying animal such as a bat. Will there be 3D representations of space? Recent experimental evidence is suggesting that a new computational model is needed to explain the results found in the bat. In this presentation, I will discuss some of the known features of underlying biological structures, current computational models, and describe our laboratory's efforts to develop neuromorphic VLSI implementations of the bat's spatial memory system and understand its role in navigation.
