时间：2021年5月13日（周四）下午15:30-17:00

Time：3:30-5:00 PM, Thursday, May 13^th, 2021

地点：云栖校区3号楼312会议室

Venue: Room 312, Building 3, Yunqi Campus

主持人：西湖大学生命科学学院讲席教授 许田

Host:   Dr. Tian Xu, Chair Professor, School of Life Sciences

主讲人/Speaker：

纽约大学杰出全球神经科学教授 汪小京

Xiao-Jing Wang, Distinguished Global Professor of Neural Science and Mathematics

Center for Neural Science, New York University

Xiao-Jing Wang is the Founding Provost, Associate Vice Chancellor for Research at NYU Shanghai, and Professor of Neural Science at New York University. Before joining NYU in the fall of 2012, Wang was Professor of Neurobiology at Yale University. At Yale he also served as the Director of the Swartz Center for Theoretical Neuroscience, and held secondary faculty appointments in Physics, Applied Mathematics and Psychology.

Wang is an expert on the neurobiology of executive and cognitive functions. His group has pioneered neural circuit models of the prefrontal cortex, which is often called the “CEO of the brain”. In particular, Wang is known for his work on the cellular basis of short-term memory, neural mechanisms for decision-making, communication and synchronization through inhibitory neurons in the brain. His research group is now embarking on a new initiative of developing neurobiologically-realistic large-scale brain circuit models of cognitively-controlled flexible behavior.

Wang received his Bachelor of Science and Doctor of Philosophy in Physics, both with the highest distinction, from the University of Brussels, Belgium. He is a recipient of an Alfred P. Sloan Research Fellowship, a National Science Foundation CAREER Award, a John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation Fellowship, Rockefeller Foundation Fellowship, Swartz Prize for Theoretical and Computational Neuroscience, Goldman-Rakic Prize for Outstanding Achievement in Cognitive Neuroscience and Brain and Behavior Research Foundation, and was elected to the Royal Academy of Science, Letters, and Fine Arts of Belgium1000 Talent Award. Wang is also a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science.

报告题目/Title:

Intelligence and the Prefrontal Cortex

讲座摘要/Abstract:

In spite of recent revolutionary advances in artificial intelligence, today’s AI systems are excellent with input-output mappings but utterly silent where there is no external input, thus devoid of mental life. By contrast, cognition and intelligence depend on specialized brain structures underlying internal mental processes, exemplified by the prefrontal cortex (often called the CEO of the brain). Here I will introduce a theory of the prefrontal cortex developed in close interaction with experimentation. In particular, I will discuss the concept of “cognitive-type” neural microcircuits capable of working memory (the brain’s ability to hold and manipulate information in the absence of sensory stimulation, such as remembering a telephone number) and decision-making (deliberate choice under uncertainty and risk, like selecting a graduate school or whom to marry). Progress in this area will bridge the psychology of the mind and the biology of the brain, as well as offer new insights for building smart machines with human-like intelligence.

讲座联系人/Contact:

科技合作部 毕老师

biguanying@westlake.edu.cn