From yaochu.jin at surrey.ac.uk Fri Jan 1 02:38:30 2016 From: yaochu.jin at surrey.ac.uk (yaochu.jin at surrey.ac.uk) Date: Fri, 1 Jan 2016 07:38:30 +0000 Subject: Connectionists: New Journal Title: IEEE Transactions on Cognitive and Developmental Systems (TCDS) Message-ID: Dear Colleagues, In January 2016, the IEEE Transactions on Autonomous Mental Development (TAMD) is renamed to the IEEE Transactions on Cognitive and Developmental Systems (TCDS). TCDS will focus on advances in the study of development and cognition in natural (humans, animals) and artificial (robots, agents) systems. It welcomes contributions from multiple disciplines related to cognition and development, including cognitive systems, cognitive robotics, developmental and epigenetic robotics, autonomous and evolutionary robotics, social robotics, multi-agent and artificial life systems, computational neuroscience, models of neural and morphological development, brain-like computing, brain-computer interface, and developmental psychology. Articles on theoretical, computational, application-oriented, and experimental studies as well as reviews in these areas are considered. Papers on interdisciplinary approaches to cognition and development in robots, agents and humans also are strongly encouraged. TCDS is financially co-sponsored by the IEEE Computational Intelligence Society, the IEEE Robotics and Automation Society, and the IEEE Consumer Electronics Society. TCDS is also technically co-sponsored by the IEEE Computer Society. Please contact Professor Yaochu Jin (yaochu.jin at surrey.ac.uk), the Editor-in-Chief of TCDS for further queries. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Yaochu Jin, Ph.D., Dr.-Ing., FIEEE Professor in Computational Intelligence Department of Computer Science, University of Surrey, UK Finland Distinguished Professor, University of Jyv?skyl?, Finland Changjiang Distinguished Professor, Northeastern University, China Editor-in-Chief, IEEE Transactions on Cognitive and Developmental Systems Editor-in-Chief, Complx & Intelligent Systems (Springer) Office: Room 35BB02 Phone: 01483 686037 -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From danko.nikolic at googlemail.com Sat Jan 2 03:55:58 2016 From: danko.nikolic at googlemail.com (Danko Nikolic) Date: Sat, 2 Jan 2016 09:55:58 +0100 Subject: Connectionists: strong AI and practopoiesis Message-ID: <5687909E.10506@gmail.com> Dear list members, This recent TEDx talk at the European Space Agency introduces my proposal on how to create strong artificial intelligence founded in the theory of practopoiesis: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zZMlzMTR6l8 The proposal suggests how to solve the problem formulated by John Searle: current AI cannot understand the world in the way humans understand. A short answer to the long story: the knowledge should not be stored primarily in synaptic weights but instead, in the learning rules; to create strong AI we need millions of specialized learning rules. I hope you will find this insightful. Best regards and Happy New Year! Danko Nikolic -- Prof. Dr. Danko Nikoli? Web: http://www.danko-nikolic.com Mail address 1: Department of Neurophysiology Max Planck Institute for Brain Research Deutschordenstr. 46 60528 Frankfurt am Main GERMANY Mail address 2: Frankfurt Institute for Advanced Studies Wolfgang Goethe University Ruth-Moufang-Str. 1 60433 Frankfurt am Main GERMANY ---------------------------- Office: (..49-69) 96769-736 Lab: (..49-69) 96769-209 Fax: (..49-69) 96769-327 danko.nikolic at gmail.com ---------------------------- From ralph.etiennecummings at gmail.com Sat Jan 2 16:39:57 2016 From: ralph.etiennecummings at gmail.com (Ralph Etienne-Cummings) Date: Sat, 2 Jan 2016 16:39:57 -0500 Subject: Connectionists: Deadline Approaching: Telluride Neuromorphic Cognition Engineering Workshop 2016 Call for Topics Message-ID: Call for Topic Area Proposals2016 Neuromorphic Cognition Engineering Workshop *Telluride, Colorado, June 26 ?July 16, 2016* *DEADLINE: January 8th, 2016* We are now accepting proposals for Topic Areas in the 2016 Telluride Neuromorphic Cognition Engineering Workshop. We support topics and projects in neuromorphic cognition, particularly those that involve solving challenging ?everyday? tasks that incorporate domain-specific knowledge, exploration, prediction, and problem solving. In particular, we are interested in projects that hold promise for addressing Grand Challenge types of problems that do not have strong solutions of any form, neuromorphic or not. These Challenge problems should feature long-duration sensorimotor problems that involve autonomous cognitive decision making. Examples might include tasks such as learning a new language, navigating through an unknown environment to locate an object or reach a desired location, visual and auditory understanding of human actions, adaptively manipulating unknown or complex objects in the service of a task, playing a game requiring inference of hidden information or long-term planning and learning, etc. Proposals related to hardware technologies that aim to bring these capabilities to reality are also encouraged. Topic proposals that aim to solve a particular problem using the multidisciplinary experience of participants will be favored over topics that simply gather a large number of people working within a discipline, or using a single technology, or approach. Topic areas for this summer's Telluride Neuromorphic Cognition Engineering Workshop will be chosen from proposals submitted to the organizers. *Topic areas can span a large field; we are looking for leadership in planning activities and inviting good people in a field.* Although past topic areas have tended to be very broad and discipline-oriented (e.g., cognition, audition, vision, robotics, neural interfacing, neuromorphic VLSI, etc.), application-oriented topic areas (e.g., sensor fusion, game-playing robot, object recognition, sound localization, human robot interaction, etc.) are especially desirable. *Topic area leaders will receive housing for themselves and their invitees, and limited travel funds.* Topic area leaders will help to define the field of neuromorphic cognition engineering through the projects they pursue and the people they invite. They shape their topic by inviting speakers and project leaders (the *invitees*) and by initiating topic area project discussions prior to the workshop. Teams of two organizers are required. One of the organizers should be an attendee of a previous Telluride Workshop (in any capacity) and has stayed at the Workshop for at least one week. *Pre-workshop topic area choices and study assignments.* Before the workshop begins, each topic area will be required to prepare and distribute study materials that constitute: 1) an introductory presentation (e.g., pptx, video, review paper) of the fundamental knowledge associated with the topic area that *everyone at the workshop* should be exposed to, and 2) a few critical papers that the participants in the topic area should read before the workshop. The topic area should 3) begin a serious group discussion of the projects (e.g., via Facebook, Skype, email, etc). *The maximum 2-page proposals should include:* 1. Title of topic area. 2. Names of the two topic leaders, their affiliations, and contact information (email addresses). 3. A paragraph explaining the focus and goals of the topic area. 4. A list of possible specific topic area projects. 5. A list of example invitees (up to six names and institutions). No commitments necessary. 6. Any other material that fits within the two-page limit that will help us make a smart choice. *Send your topic area proposal* in pdf or text format to organizers13 at neuromorphs.net with subject line containing "topic area proposal". *Proposals must be received by January 8, 2016*; proposals received after the deadline may still be considered if space is available. *We expect to accept 4-5 topic areas*, each with 5 invitees*.* If your proposal for the topic area is not accepted, we will work with you to see if there is a natural way to include your ideas (and you) into the accepted topic areas. We hope to have significant turn-over each year in the topic areas and leaders to ensure fresh new ideas and participants. See the Institute of Neuromorphic Engineering (www.ine-web.org) for background information on the workshop and neuromorphs.net for past workshop wikis. We look forward to your topic proposals! *Deadline: January 8, 2016* *The Workshop Directors:* Cornelia Ferm?ller (University of Maryland), Ralph Etienne-Cummings (Johns Hopkins Univ.) Shih-Chii Liu (University of Zurich and ETH Zurich), Timmer Horiuchi (University of Maryland), Katalin Gotthard (University of Arizona), Michael Pfeiffer (University of Zurich and ETH Zurich), Francisco Barranco (University of Granada) *Former 2007-2013 Workshop Director:* Tobi Delbruck (University of Zurich and ETH Zurich) -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Ralph Etienne-Cummings, PhD, FIEEE Professor and Chairman Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering Computational Sensor Motor Systems Lab Laboratory for Computational Sensing and Robotics The Johns Hopkins University Baltimore, MD [image: cid:image001.png at 01CFC064.B58B46A0] -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: image001.png Type: image/png Size: 20171 bytes Desc: not available URL: From nicosia at dmi.unict.it Sun Jan 3 05:06:24 2016 From: nicosia at dmi.unict.it (Giuseppe Nicosia) Date: Sun, 3 Jan 2016 11:06:24 +0100 Subject: Connectionists: SSBSS 2016 - Save the date: 8-14 July 2016, Volterra (Pisa) Tuscany, Italy - 3rd Int. Synthetic & Systems Biology Summer School Message-ID: * Our sincere apologies if you receive multiple copies of this announcement * The 3rd International Synthetic & Systems Biology Summer School is a great opportunity to exchange ideas and information with colleagues and peers from around the world and discover the latest trends and new exciting results in Synthetic and Systems Biology. International Synthetic and Systems Biology Summer School - SSBSS 2016, 8-14 July 2016, Volterra (Pisa) - Tuscany, Italy ssbss.school at gmail.com http://www.taosciences.it/ssbss/ Previous Editions: SSBSS 2015 http://www.taosciences.it/ssbss2015/ SSBSS 2014 http://www.taosciences.it/ssbss2014/ -- Giuseppe Nicosia, Ph.D. Associate Professor of Computer Engineering Dept of Mathematics & Computer Science University of Catania Viale A. Doria, 6 - 95125 Catania, Italy P +39 095 7383048 nicosia at dmi.unict.it http://www.dmi.unict.it/nicosia ================================================================== 3rd International Synthetic & Systems Biology Summer School - SSBSS 2016 * Biology meets Computer Science & Engineering * July 8-14, 2016 - Volterra (Pisa), Tuscany, Italy http://www.taosciences.it/ssbss/ ================================================================== 2nd International Workshop on Machine learning, Optimization & big Data - MOD 2016 August 26-29, 2016 - Volterra (Pisa), Tuscany, Italy http://www.taosciences.it/mod/ ================================================================== -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From joan.bruna at berkeley.edu Sun Jan 3 14:00:32 2016 From: joan.bruna at berkeley.edu (Joan Bruna Estrach) Date: Sun, 3 Jan 2016 11:00:32 -0800 Subject: Connectionists: Machine Learning Summer School 2016 in Cadiz, Spain Message-ID: <33C9B9DC-6D82-4C15-B830-465B5AA99431@berkeley.edu> Dear Colleagues, *Apologies for duplicated messages* This is the Second call for Applications for: -------------------------------------------------------------------------- MACHINE LEARNING SUMMER SCHOOL 2016 at the University of Cadiz, Spain, May 11th to 21st 2016 http://learning.mpi-sws.org/mlss2016 -------------------------------------------------------------------------- Overview -------------------------------------------------------------------------- The machine learning summer school provides graduate students, researchers and industry professionals with an intense learning experience on theory and applications of modern machine learning. Over the course of ten days, a panel of internationally renowned experts will offer lectures and tutorials covering a diverse range of theoretical and applied topics. This time the MLSS is co-located just after AISTATS 2016, in the medieval town of Cadiz (south of Spain). Confirmed Speakers and Topics so far: ????????????????????????????????????? Arthur Gretton (UCL Gatsby), Kernel Methods Arthur Szlam (Facebook AI Research), Deep Learning Francis Bach (ENS), Optimization Jonas Peters (MPI-IS), Causality Le Song (Georgia Institute of Technology), Machine Learning for Networks Mathias Betghe (Center Integrative Neuroscience, U Tubingen), Machine Learning for Neuroscience Nando de Freitas (Oxford University, DeepMind), Deep Learning Neil Lawrence (University of Sheffield), Gaussian Processes Nicolas Le Roux (Criteo), Large Scale Machine Learning Peter Abbeel (UC Berkeley), Deep Reinforcement Learning Samory Kptufe (Princeton), Learning Theory Sebastien Bubek (Microsoft Research), Bandits Stefanie Jegelka (MIT), Submodularity Stephane Mallat (ENS), Mathematics of Convolutional Networks Tamara Broderick (MIT), Nonparametrics and Bayesian Statistics Michel Besserve (MPI-IS), Practical on Machine Learning for Neuroscience John Schulmann (UC Berkeley/OpenAI), Practical on Deep Reinforcement Learning Isabel Valera (MPI-SWS), Practical on Machine Learning for Networks Durk Kingma (U Amsterdam/OpenAI), Practical on Deep Learning Application process -------------------------------------------------------------------------- Applications are invited from graduate students, postdoctoral researchers and industry professionals looking to use, or already using machine learning methods in their work. This includes researchers in applied fields as well as students of machine learning itself. Prior experience is not strictly required, but helpful. A small number of travel stipends will be available. Applicants will be asked to submit a CV, a cover letter of up to 2000 characters, and a short letter of recommendation from one referee of their choice. We are also seeking to give participants a chance to discuss their own work with their peers and the speakers. Each applicant is thus invited to provide the title of a poster they would like to present at the school. For more information visit http://learning.mpi-sws.org/mlss2016/application/ Important Dates -------------------------------------------------------------------------- * Monday November 23 2015 application system opens * Sunday Jan 31 2016 DEADLINE FOR APPLICATIONS * Sunday Feb 28 2016 notification of acceptance Organizers ????????????????????????????????????? Manuel Gomez Rodriguez (MPI-SWS) Joan Bruna (UC Berkeley) inquiries should be directed to mlss2016 at mpi-sws.org? ========================================================================== -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From daniele.marinazzo at ugent.be Mon Jan 4 03:52:12 2016 From: daniele.marinazzo at ugent.be (Daniele Marinazzo) Date: Mon, 4 Jan 2016 09:52:12 +0100 Subject: Connectionists: Fully funded PhD position at the University of Ghent, Belgium Message-ID: The lab of Daniele Marinazzo (www.ugent.be/~dmarinaz), at the department of Data Analysis, Faculty of Psychology and Pedagogical Sciences of the University of Ghent, Belgium, is looking for a PhD student. The position is fully funded for 4 years by the Research Foundation Flanders (FWO). The research subject involves advanced statistical data analysis of fMRI data. The student will be part of a research group focusing on the development and validation of new methods for the analysis of neuroimaging data, in the framework of a multidisciplinary collaboration with psychologists and clinicians. Both candidates with a technical degree and candidates with a psychology degree but an interest in programming and quantitative analyses are encouraged to apply. Knowledge of at least one programming language (python, matlab, R ?) and an interest for multidisciplinary research are required. The University of Gent (www.ugent.be) hosts a vibrant research community and offers excellent facilities to students and employees. The most likely starting date is October 2016 but earlier appointments can be considered. Candidates are invited to send a motivation letter and the names of two referees to Daniele Marinazzo (daniele.marinazzo at ugent.be) Informal inquiries and requests for further information are most welcome. -- Daniele Marinazzo -- Department of Data Analysis Faculty of Psychology and Pedagogical Sciences, Ghent University Henri Dunantlaan 1, B-9000 Ghent, Belgium +32 (0) 9 264 6375 http://users.ugent.be/~dmarinaz/ http://helpdesk.ugent.be/e-maildisclaimer.php -- Daniele Marinazzo -- Department of Data Analysis Faculty of Psychology and Pedagogical Sciences, Ghent University Henri Dunantlaan 1, B-9000 Ghent, Belgium +32 (0) 9 264 6375 http://users.ugent.be/~dmarinaz/ http://helpdesk.ugent.be/e-maildisclaimer.php -- Daniele Marinazzo -- Department of Data Analysis Faculty of Psychology and Pedagogical Sciences, Ghent University Henri Dunantlaan 1, B-9000 Ghent, Belgium +32 (0) 9 264 6375 http://users.ugent.be/~dmarinaz/ http://helpdesk.ugent.be/e-maildisclaimer.php -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From dwang at cse.ohio-state.edu Sun Jan 3 20:15:42 2016 From: dwang at cse.ohio-state.edu (DeLiang Wang) Date: Sun, 3 Jan 2016 20:15:42 -0500 Subject: Connectionists: NEURAL NETWORKS, Jan. 2016 Message-ID: <5689C7BE.70101@cse.ohio-state.edu> Neural Networks - Volume 73, Jan. 2016 http://www.journals.elsevier.com/neural-networks Editorial: State of Neural Networks is strong Kenji Doya, DeLiang Wang Constructing general partial differential equations using polynomial and neural networks Ladislav Zjavka, Witold Pedrycz Distributed parameter estimation in unreliable sensor networks via broadcast gossip algorithms Huiwei Wang, Xiaofeng Liao, Zidong Wang, Tingwen Huang, Guo Chen A linear functional strategy for regularized ranking Galyna Kriukova, Oleksandra Panasiuk, Sergei V. Pereverzyev, Pavlo Tkachenko One pass learning for generalized classifier neural network Buse Melis Ozyildirim, Mutlu Avci A non-penalty recurrent neural network for solving a class of constrained optimization problems Alireza Hosseini Global O(pow(t,-alpha)) stability and global asymptotical periodicity for a non-autonomous fractional-order neural networks with time-varying delays Boshan Chen, Jiejie Chen Global Mittag-Leffler synchronization of fractional-order neural networks with discontinuous activations Zhixia Ding, Yi Shen, Leimin Wang Robust fixed-time synchronization of delayed Cohen-Grossberg neural networks Ying Wan, Jinde Cao, Guanghui Wen, Wenwu Yu Finite-time synchronization of fractional-order memristor-based neural networks with time delays G. Velmurugan, R. Rakkiyappan, Jinde Cao From hava at cs.umass.edu Mon Jan 4 10:11:52 2016 From: hava at cs.umass.edu (Hava Siegelmann) Date: Mon, 04 Jan 2016 10:11:52 -0500 Subject: Connectionists: Postdoctoral Research Associate Message-ID: <568A8BB8.7080503@cs.umass.edu> *Postdoctoral Research Associate ? Computer Science* ** The BINDS lab in the College of Information and Computer Sciences at the University of Massachusetts is seeking applicants for a Postdoctoral Research Associate in the area of computational neuroscience, neural networks, and machine learning.The specific appointment will be working with Professor Hava Siegelmann. Anticipated appointment start date is January 25, 2016 (negotiable) for one year and renewable, contingent upon funding. Please contact me directly in this email with any question or updates and with any particular request you may have The University of Massachusetts Amherst is an Affirmative Action/Equal Opportunity Employer of women, minorities, protected veterans and individuals with disabilities and encourages applications from these and other protected group members. -- Hava T. Siegelmann, Ph.D. Professor Director, BINDS Lab (Biologically Inspired Neural Dynamical Systems) Dept. of Computer Science Program of Neuroscience and Behavior University of Massachusetts Amherst Amherst, MA, 01003 Phone: 413-545-2744 Fax: 413-545-1249 LAB WEBSITE: http://binds.cs.umass.edu/ -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From hava at cs.umass.edu Mon Jan 4 10:16:45 2016 From: hava at cs.umass.edu (Hava Siegelmann) Date: Mon, 04 Jan 2016 10:16:45 -0500 Subject: Connectionists: how-brain-architecture-relates-to-consciousness-and-abstract-thought Message-ID: <568A8CDD.5010601@cs.umass.edu> Hi, wanted to share with you a writeup on this topic: http://www.kurzweilai.net/how-brain-architecture-relates-to-consciousness-and-abstract-thought We are going to continue the work in this direction and be hiring grad student and a postdoc for it. Regards Hava -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From erik at oist.jp Mon Jan 4 04:02:00 2016 From: erik at oist.jp (Erik De Schutter) Date: Mon, 4 Jan 2016 18:02:00 +0900 Subject: Connectionists: Okinawa/OIST Computational Neuroscience Course 2016: applications open Message-ID: <8290646F-E93B-491E-802E-20A55E829BF7@oist.jp> OKINAWA/OIST COMPUTATIONAL NEUROSCIENCE COURSE 2016 Methods, Neurons, Networks and Behaviors June 13 - June 30, 2016 Okinawa Institute of Science and Technology Graduate University, Japan https://groups.oist.jp/ocnc The aim of the Okinawa/OIST Computational Neuroscience Course is to provide opportunities for young researchers with theoretical backgrounds to learn the latest advances in neuroscience, and for those with experimental backgrounds to have hands-on experience in computational modeling. We invite graduate students and postgraduate researchers to participate in the course, held from June 13th through June 30th, 2016 at an oceanfront seminar house of the Okinawa Institute of Science and Technology Graduate University. Applications are through the course web page (https://groups.oist.jp/ocnc) only; January 4 - February 5, 2016. Applicants will receive confirmation of acceptance in March. Like in preceding years, OCNC will be a comprehensive three-week course covering single neurons, networks, and behaviors with ample time for student projects. The first week will focus exclusively on methods with hands-on tutorials during the afternoons, while the second and third weeks will have lectures by international experts. The course has a strong hands-on component based on student proposed modeling or data analysis projects, which are further refined with the help of a dedicated tutor. Applicants are required to propose their project at the time of application. There is no tuition fee. The sponsor will provide lodging and meals during the course and may support travel for those without funding. We hope that this course will be a good opportunity for theoretical and experimental neuroscientists to meet each other and to explore the attractive nature and culture of Okinawa, the southernmost island prefecture of Japan. Invited faculty: ? Erik De Schutter (OIST) ? Sophie Deneve (?cole Normale Sup?rieure, France) ? Kenji Doya (OIST) ? Chris Eliasmith (University of Waterloo, Canada) ? Tomoki Fukai (RIKEN BSI, Japan) ? Michael H?usser (University College London, UK) ? Yukiyasu Kamitani (ATR & Kyoto University, Japan) ? Etienne Koechlin (?cole Normale Sup?rieure, France) ? Bernd Kuhn (OIST) ? Stefan Mihalas (Allen Institute for Brain Science, USA) ? Partha Mitra (Cold Spring Harbor, USA) ? Astrid Prinz (Emory University, USA) ? John Rinzel (New York University, USA) ? Yoko Yazaki-Sugiyama (OIST) From urut at caltech.edu Mon Jan 4 11:54:05 2016 From: urut at caltech.edu (Ueli Rutishauser) Date: Mon, 4 Jan 2016 08:54:05 -0800 Subject: Connectionists: Postdoc position open in Rutishauser Lab (human single-neurons) Message-ID: *Postdoctoral fellowship in human intracranial electrophysiology: Cedars-Sinai Medical Center and California Institute of Technology (Los Angeles)* Applications are invited to join a McKnight Endowment Fund for Neuroscience and NSF funded research program investigating the neural mechanisms of learning and memory in humans. The applicant will work on intracranial single-unit recordings from human subjects, investigating questions related to the encoding and retrieval of memory. This will include experimental work with patients (electrophysiology and behavior), data analysis and processing, spike-train analysis, and experimental design. The focus of this position will be on single-neuron recordings from the medial temporal lobe in epilepsy patients to investigate the role of theta-oscillations in coordinating activity and how such coordination relates to memory. The applicant will have access to state-of-the art equipment, facilities and analytical methods and will be part of an established team of investigators at both Cedars-Sinai and the California Institute of Technology (Ueli Rutishauser, Ralph Adolphs, Adam Mamelak), with ample opportunity to learn new techniques and methods. This position is based on the Cedars-Sinai campus. Candidates should have a recent PhD in systems, cognitive, or computational neuroscience with a track-record of first-author publications. Strong programming (Matlab or similar), data analysis, statistics and electrophysiology skills are essential. Excellent written and oral English communication skills are required, including the ability to communicate with patients and their families. Individuals with previous human intracranial EEG experience and/or macaque single neuron recordings that wish to expand into human single-unit recordings are encouraged to apply. The position is available as early as March 1st 2016, with a competitive salary commensurate with prior experience (NIH scale). The position is available with an initial appointment for one year and renewal based upon satisfactory performance. Applicants must pass background screening and health checks to be able to work with patients. Caltech and Cedars-Sinai Medical Center are equal opportunity employers and women and minorities are encouraged to apply. Interested applicants should send a CV, statement of research accomplishments and interests, copies of 2-3 representative publications and contact information for 2-3 reference letters to Ueli Rutishauser at rutishauseru at csmc.edu. Informal inquiries are welcome. All information should be sent in pdf format. Further information about the lab can be found at www.rutishauserlab.org . -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From tai at cnbc.cmu.edu Mon Jan 4 16:44:17 2016 From: tai at cnbc.cmu.edu (Tai Sing Lee) Date: Mon, 4 Jan 2016 16:44:17 -0500 Subject: Connectionists: Carnegie Mellon - University of Pittsburgh Joint Summer Undergraduate Program in Computational Neuroscience Message-ID: <328D17C8-8623-4EA8-B7DF-09A3F9FFFEE0@cnbc.cmu.edu> Carnegie Mellon - University of Pittsburgh Joint Summer Undergraduate Program in Computational Neuroscience Undergraduates interested in receiving research training in computational neuroscience are encouraged to apply to an NIH-sponsored summer program at the Center for the Neural Basis of Cognition in Pittsburgh. The Center for the Neural Basis of Cognition is a joint interdisciplinary program of Carnegie Mellon University and the University of Pittsburgh. Starting in May of 2016, a select group of talented undergraduates will embark on a 10-week residential program that provides intensive, mentored research experiences in computational and theoretical neuroscience. This program is intended for students who wish to pursue a Ph.D. after graduation. Any undergraduate may apply, but we are especially interested in attracting students with strong quantitative backgrounds especially juniors and seniors from colleges and universities that do not have extensive research programs, and students from groups underrepresented in the sciences. Participants must be U.S. citizens or permanent residents. Selected students will receive a stipend and university dormitory housing. The core of the program is the opportunity to carry out an individual mentored research project working closely with a faculty mentor. Other aspects of the scientific program include: faculty research talks, student presentations and discussion of articles from the scientific literature, presentations on career options and scientific ethics, and a concluding symposium in which students present their research. The 2016 program will run from late May through early August, 2016 (precise dates will be announced in March). The final deadline for application is February 16. All participants must be United States citizens or permanent residents, must be enrolled at a 4-year accredited institution, and must be in their sophomore or junior year at the time of application. Students from groups underrepresented in the sciences are encouraged to apply. 2016 uPNC Summer Fellowship Application available here: http://www.cnbc.cmu.edu/images/CNBC_general/upncsummerapplication2016.doc Application can be returned via email or regular mail (see addresses below). In addition to the application, the following items are required for evaluation: A brief (one page) essay about your interest and experience in neural computation. Official transcript from the institution you are attending Two letters from professional references. You should contact your recommenders and ask them to mail or email a letter directly to us. SAT/ACT scores (do NOT have to be official; photocopies are acceptable) Documents should be mailed to: Computational Neuroscience Summer Program Center for the Neural Basis of Cognition Carnegie Mellon University 4400 Fifth Avenue Suite 115 Pittsburgh, PA 15213-2617 CNBC-summer-UG at andrew.cmu.edu For more information go to this sites: http://www.cnbc.cmu.edu/summercompneuro -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From hans.ekkehard.plesser at nmbu.no Tue Jan 5 02:30:01 2016 From: hans.ekkehard.plesser at nmbu.no (Hans Ekkehard Plesser) Date: Tue, 5 Jan 2016 07:30:01 +0000 Subject: Connectionists: NEST 2.10 supports gap junctions and structural plasticity Message-ID: <1DEBBA1D-60E7-4E0E-B6D5-2C21C2E4B7AE@nmbu.no> Dear Colleagues! The NEST Initiative is pleased to announce the release of NEST version 2.10.0. The most notable changes over v2.8.0 are: * Support for simulations of gap junctions (see Jan Hahne et al., 2015) * Framework for structural plasticity (see Markus Butz et al., 2013 and Markus Butz et al., 2014) * Full support for the K computer (just in case you found one under your Christmas tree ;-)) All users are encouraged to upgrade and adapt their simulation scripts to the changes in the user interface at this point in time to benefit from the improvements in the new version. For a full list of changes and download links, see https://github.com/nest/nest-simulator/releases/tag/v2.10.0 Best regards, Hans Ekkehard Plesser President, The NEST Initiative -- Dr. Hans Ekkehard Plesser, Associate Professor Section Head Dept. of Mathematical Sciences and Technology Norwegian University of Life Sciences PO Box 5003, 1432 Aas, Norway Phone +47 6723 1560 Email hans.ekkehard.plesser at nmbu.no Home http://arken.umb.no/~plesser From pierre-yves.oudeyer at inria.fr Tue Jan 5 04:35:10 2016 From: pierre-yves.oudeyer at inria.fr (Pierre-Yves Oudeyer) Date: Tue, 5 Jan 2016 10:35:10 +0100 Subject: Connectionists: [publication and call for dialog] IEEE CIS Newsletter on Autonomous Mental Development, Fall 2015 Message-ID: <7BAACD7C-CD4B-45EE-8F46-246C080AD4A1@inria.fr> Dear colleagues, I am happy to announce the release of the latest issue of the IEEE CIS Newsletter on Cognitive and Developmental Systems (open access, previously names newsletter on Autonomous Mental Development). This is a biannual newsletter addressing computational modeling of developmental and cognitive processes in natural and artificial organisms, from humans to robots, at the crossroads of cognitive science, developmental psychology, machine intelligence and neuroscience. It is available at: https://goo.gl/HQAMsd Featuring dialog: === "Representational redescription: the next challenge?" == Dialog Initiated by St?phane Doncieux, with responses from Jessica Kosie and Dare Baldwin, Georges Konidaris, Freek Stulp and Timothy Hospedales, Paul Verschure and Giovanni Pezzulo, Frank Guerin, Paul Abelha and Bipin Indurkhya. == This issue?s dialog explores various challenges of how and why capabilities to change representations could be happening in robots. In particular, contributors discuss how new representations can be formed out of the dynamic interaction between learning algorithms, cognitive architecture and their physical and social embodiment. Call for new dialog: === "Moving Beyond Nature-Nurture: a Problem of Science or Communication? ? == Dialog initiated by John Spencer, Mark Blumberg and David Shenk == John Spencer, Mark Blumberg and David Shenk observe that in spite of numerous scientific discoveries supporting the view of development as a complex multi-factored process, the discussions of development in several scientific fields and in the general public are still strongly organized around the nature/nurture distinction. Thus, they ask a crucial question: is this because there is not yet sufficient scientific evidence, or is this because the simplicity of the nature/nurture framework is much easier to communicate (or just better communicated by its supporters)? Those of you interested in reacting to this dialog initiation are welcome to submit a response by April 15th, 2015. The length of each response must be between 600 and 800 words including references (contact pierre-yves.oudeyer at inria.fr). You will also find news about the IEEE CIS CDS Technical Committee and the ICDL-Epirob 2016 conference. Let me remind you that previous issues of the newsletter are all open-access and available at: http://icdl-epirob.org/cdsnl I wish you a stimulating reading! Best regards, Pierre-Yves Oudeyer, Editor of the IEEE CIS Newsletter on Cognitive and Developmental Systems Chair of the IEEE CIS AMD Technical Committee on Cognitive and Developmental Systems Research director, Inria Head of Flower project-team Inria and Ensta ParisTech, France http://www.pyoudeyer.com https://flowers.inria.fr http://www.poppy-project.org -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From elio.tuci at gmail.com Tue Jan 5 03:05:37 2016 From: elio.tuci at gmail.com (Elio Tuci) Date: Tue, 5 Jan 2016 09:05:37 +0100 Subject: Connectionists: CFP: International Conference on the Simulation of Adaptive Behavior (SAB) Message-ID: SAB 2016: FROM ANIMALS TO ANIMATS 14 The 14th International Conference on the Simulation of Adaptive Behavior (SAB2016) 23-26 August 2016, Aberystwyth, UK http://www.sab2016.org IMPORTANT DATES: ? Tutorial Proposal Deadline: 14th December, 2015 ? Tutorial Notification of Acceptance: 11th January, 2016 ? Tutorials: 23 August, 2016 ? Paper Submission Deadline: Monday 21st March, 2016 ? Notification of Acceptance: Monday 16th May, 2016 ? Camera Ready Submission: Monday 6th June, 2016 ? Conference: 24-26 August, 2016 ORGANISING COMMITTEE ? Conference Chairs: Myra S. Wilson, John Hallam ? Program Chairs: Elio Tuci, Alexandros Giagkos ? Tutorial Chair: Fred Labrosse Scope of the Conference: The objective of this interdisciplinary conference is to bring together researchers in computer science, artificial intelligence, artificial life, control, robotics, neurosciences, ethology, evolutionary biology, and related fields in order to further our understanding of the behaviours and underlying mechanisms that allow natural and artificial animals to adapt and survive in uncertain environments. The conference will focus on experiments with well-defined models (robot models, computer simulation models, mathematical models) designed to help characterise and compare various organisational principles or architectures underlying adaptive behaviour in real animals and in synthetic agents, the animats. Conference Format Following the tradition of SAB conferences, the conference will be single track with additional poster sessions. There will also be a day of tutorials (23rd August). Relevant Research Areas SAB 2016 solicits contributions dealing with any aspect of adaptive behaviour in natural and artificial systems. Typical, but not exclusive, topics of interest are: - The Animat approach - Motor control - Body and brain co-evolution - Self-assembling and self-replication - Sensory-motor coordination - Action selection and behavioural sequencing - Navigation and mapping - Internal models and representation - Evolution, development and learning - Collective and social behaviour - Applied adaptive behaviour - Motivation and emotion - Communication and language - Emergent structures and behaviours - Neural correlates of behaviour - Evolutionary and co-evolutionary approaches - Bio-inspired and hybrid robotics - Autonomous robotics - Humanoid robotics - Cognitive and developmental robotics - Software agents and virtual creatures - Philosophical and psychological issues - Animats in education Paper Submission Instruction and Publication Details: Submitted papers must not exceed 10 pages. Detailed submission instructions are available from the conference web site (http://www.sab2016.org). All accepted papers with oral or poster presentation will be published in Springer Lecture Notes in Artificial Intelligence series conference proceedings. Selected authors may additionally be invited to submit extended versions for a conference Special Issue of the journal, Adaptive Behavior. Tutorials: The SAB 2016 organising committee invites proposals for tutorials, which will be held on the 23rd August 2016. Instructions for preparing the tutorial proposal and further details on the tutorials can be found at http://www.sab2016.org. Exhibition During SAB2016 there will be an exhibition section, where latest developments in hardware and software technologies will be displayed to the conference attendees and the press. Best Paper Award Details of the best paper award will be announced in due course. Further Information Up-to-date information will be published on the web site http://www.sab2016.org. For information about local arrangements, registration forms, etc., please refer to the web site or contact the local organisers at the address below. Conference Address Computer Science Department Llandinam Building Aberystwyth University, Aberystwyth. SY23 3DB UK Tel: +44-1970-622928 Fax: +44-1970-628536 email: sab2016-conference at isab.org -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From bard at pitt.edu Mon Jan 4 11:39:25 2016 From: bard at pitt.edu (Ermentrout, G Bard) Date: Mon, 4 Jan 2016 16:39:25 +0000 Subject: Connectionists: XPPAUT 8.0 Released Message-ID: <1451925565426.41508@pitt.edu> Sorry for any cross posting on this. I am happy to announce that the new version of XPPAUT is now available for download at: http://www.math.pitt.edu/~bard/xpp/xpp.html The new version uses the most recent version of AUTO and allows for much better two-parameter continuation of periodic and homoclinic orbits. In addition there are dozens of new command line options and support for CUDA code. Binaries for the big three and source are available -Bard Ermentrout -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From auke.ijspeert at epfl.ch Tue Jan 5 10:44:51 2016 From: auke.ijspeert at epfl.ch (Auke Ijspeert) Date: Tue, 5 Jan 2016 16:44:51 +0100 Subject: Connectionists: EPFL, Biorobotics lab: PhD student position in neuromechanical models of vertebrate locomotion Message-ID: <568BE4F3.4080008@epfl.ch> PhD student position in neuromechanical models of vertebrate locomotion http://biorob.epfl.ch/openings The Biorobotics laboratory (Biorob, http://biorob.epfl.ch/) at EPFL (Lausanne, Switzerland) at EPFL (Lausanne, Switzerland) anticipates to have one open PhD studentship in computational neuroscience and biorobotics, starting on April 2016 (or asap after that). The goal of the project is to develop neuromechanical models of vertebrate locomotion, together with Marc-Olivier Gewaltig (computational neuroscientist) and Gregoire Courtine (neuroscientist). *The neuromechanical models will include numerical models of spinal cord circuits coupled to biomechanical models of the body. The first target animal will be the mouse; depending on progress, human models might be developed in a second stage. The spinal cord models might also be tested and validated in some of the quadruped robots developed by the Biorobotics laboratory. The position will be fully funded thanks to a grant from the Human Brain Project. EPFL is one of the leading Institutes of Technology in Europe and offers internationally competitive salaries and research infrastructure. Requirements: Candidates need to have a Master degree in a field related to computational neuroscience e.g. in physics or computer science. The ideal candidate for this position should have a strong math background (e.g. in dynamical systems), good programming skills, and interest/expertise in modeling neural circuits and biomechanical systems, and in locomotion. How to apply for the position: Step 1: The position is only open to applicants who have been accepted by the EPFL doctoral school (see http://phd.epfl.ch/). The first step is therefore to fill the applications for one of the relevant EPFL doctoral programs in robotics (http://phd.epfl.ch/EDPR) or neuroscience (http://phd.epfl.ch/neuroscience). Step 2: In parallel to step 1, or better, once accepted by one of the doctoral programs (please specify which doctoral program and the date of acceptance), the application to the position should be sent by email to Prof. Auke Ijspeert and consist of a motivation letter (explaining why you are interested in the project, and why you feel qualified for it) and a copy of the doctoral program application. Informal inquiries about the relevance of an application can be sent to auke.ijspeert at epfl.ch (e.g. before or while submitting an application to the doctoral school), but responses can be slow because of a heavy schedule and a filled mail box. Deadline and starting date: Applications will be considered continuously until the positions are filled. The ideal starting date is the *1st of April 2016* (or as soon as possible after that date). Note that the doctoral program in robotics has a deadline on January 15 2016. Contact: Information concerning the type of research carried out by the group can be found at http://biorob.epfl.ch/. You should send your application and any inquiry by email to: Prof. Auke Jan Ijspeert , auke.ijspeert at epfl.ch -- ----------------------------------------------------------------- Prof Auke Jan Ijspeert Associate Professor Biorobotics Laboratory EPFL-STI-IBI-BIOROB EPFL, Ecole Polytechnique F?d?rale de Lausanne Station 14, CH 1015 Lausanne, Switzerland Office: INN 237 Tel: +41 21 693 2658, Fax: +41 21 693 3705 www: http://biorob.epfl.ch Email: Auke.Ijspeert at epfl.ch ----------------------------------------------------------------- From n.lepora at bristol.ac.uk Wed Jan 6 02:18:43 2016 From: n.lepora at bristol.ac.uk (Nathan Lepora) Date: Wed, 6 Jan 2016 07:18:43 +0000 Subject: Connectionists: [jobs] PhD studentship in Tactile Robotics (University of Bristol) Message-ID: PhD Position in Tactile Robotics, University of Bristol and Bristol Robotics Laboratory, UK. Deadline for expressions of interest: 18th January, 2016. Applications are invited for a 3.5 year funded PhD Studentship at the University of Bristol and Bristol Robotics Laboratory, UK. Funding is available from the Faculty of Engineering for outstanding UK candidates, at a tax-free stipend of ?14,057 (2015-2016) per year plus travel and research funds. Further details can be found at http://www.bristol.ac.uk/engineering/graduate/pg-open/funding/epsrcdta.html The development of robust and accurate artificial touch is required for autonomous robotic systems to interact physically with complex environments, underlying the future robotization of broad areas of manufacturing, food production, healthcare and assisted living that presently rely on human labour. Our lab has developed statistical methods for robot touch based on the neuroscience of perceptual decision making, principally new algorithms for biomimetic active touch combining perception and control. Our lab is also working on robust methods for tactile sensing and control of robotic hands based on the interaction between action and perception. We also fabricate our own tactile sensors and tactile robot hands. Further background on the research can be found on the PI's website (www.lepora.com). The student will work closely with the PI (Dr Lepora) and a postdoctoral Research Associate, and will join three other PhD students working on related projects in tactile robotics. The Studentship is available from now and will remain open for applications until the position is filled. Suitable applicants should initially contact N. Lepora (n.lepora at bristol.ac.uk) by 18th January enclosing a copy of their CV. **Please note that this studentship is available ONLY to UK citizens, or EU citizens resident in the UK for at least 3 years.** -- Dr N Lepora Dept of Engineering Maths Phone: +44 (0) 117 331 5169 Merchant Venturers Building Website: http://www.lepora.com University of Bristol BS8 1UB Lecturer in Engineering Mathematics http://www.bristol.ac.uk/engineering/people/nathan-f-lepora Program Director (UoB) for the MSc in Robotics http://www.bristol.ac.uk/engineering/interdisciplinary/robotics/ From behrmann at cmu.edu Tue Jan 5 20:51:20 2016 From: behrmann at cmu.edu (Marlene Behrmann) Date: Tue, 5 Jan 2016 20:51:20 -0500 Subject: Connectionists: Postdoc position in neural engineering to design, implement, and test a novel noninvasive neural recording system (CMU, Pittsburgh) Message-ID: <568C7318.4000106@cmu.edu> A team of three engineers (Grover, Weldon, Kelly) is seeking an interdisciplinary postdoctoral fellow for a 1 year position (extendable, depending on fit and progress) to design, implement and experimentally test, a high density neural recording system. The ongoing project will leverage results obtained by the investigators to disrupt neural recording systems as they exist, providing novel solutions to long-standing open problems of clinical and neuroscientific relevance. A successful candidate will be paid competitively. The overall team comprises: * Pulkit Grover (Information theory, signal processing, circuits, CMU ECE and CNBC) * Jeffrey Weldon (circuits, devices, CMU ECE) * Shawn Kelly (circuits, devices, neural implants, CMU ECE and ICES) * Marlene Behrmann (neuroscience, CMU Psych and CNBC) * Michael Tarr (neuroscience, head of psychology, CMU Psych and CNBC) * Dr. Mark Richardson (Director, Adult Epilepsy and Movement Disorders Surgery and Brain Modulation Lab, University of Pittsburgh and CNBC) The candidate will be expected to interact regularly with the first three, and intermittently with the rest, to lead this project. Preferred skills: System-level design and hardware implementation experience is a must. Experience in board design will be helpful. Expertise in MATLAB, circuits, neuroengineering/neuroscience, signal processing, information theory, devices, is helpful but not necessary. The team also includes one Ph.D. and six undergraduate students working on information theory and circuit design for these systems, and actively collaborates with faculty in psychology and neuroscience, and clinicians. The fellow is expected to focus on system design, implementation, and testing. The concepts and implementation developed by our group lay the foundation for this project. Within one year, the fellow is expected to: * Lead design and implementation of an ongoing high-density neural recording system project at CMU (using off-the-shelf components), and * (Collaboratively) experimentally validate it, neuroscientifically and clinically. As such, this is a challenging yet accomplishable postdoctoral position providing a unique interdisciplinary opportunity to the applicants. Applicants should hold a PhD. Those with a mix of board-design, circuits-design, and/or signal processing/optimization/bioengineering background, with interest in neuroscience/neuroengineering/bioengineering, are especially encouraged to apply. Interested applicants should send a letter of interest, a CV, and the names and contact information for 3 researchers who can provide a recommendation: pulkit at cmu.edu , jweldon at andrew.cmu.edu, skkelly at andrew.cmu.edu . For further information, please send an email to the three email addresses as well. The position is available immediately and applications will be considered until the position is filled. -- Marlene Behrmann, Ph.D George A. and Helen Dunham Cowan Professor of Cognitive Neuroscience Center for the Neural Basis of Cognition and Department of Psychology Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, USA (412) 268-2790 behrmann at cmu.edu -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From rsun at rpi.edu Wed Jan 6 13:08:14 2016 From: rsun at rpi.edu (Professor Ron Sun) Date: Wed, 6 Jan 2016 13:08:14 -0500 Subject: Connectionists: [COGPSY] [publication and call for dialog] Autonomous Mental Development In-Reply-To: <7BAACD7C-CD4B-45EE-8F46-246C080AD4A1@inria.fr> References: <7BAACD7C-CD4B-45EE-8F46-246C080AD4A1@inria.fr> Message-ID: <9260EDDB-3451-45CD-B8FB-3ECF914A50D5@rpi.edu> The discussions below regarding "representational redescription" remind me of the following paper: R. Sun, Autonomous generation of symbolic representations through subsymbolic activities . Philosophical Psychology, Vol.26, No.6, pp.888-912. 2013. I will appreciate any feedback on this paper. While I am at it, here is another (old) paper on this topic: R. Sun, E. Merrill, and T. Peterson, From implicit skills to explicit knowledge: A bottom-up model of skill learning.? Cognitive Science, Vol.25, No.2, pp.203-244. 2001. [PDF ] as well as this book: R. Sun, Duality of the Mind . Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Mahwah, NJ. 2002. Best regards, -Ron > On Jan 5, 2016, at 4:35 AM, Pierre-Yves Oudeyer wrote: > > > Dear colleagues, > > I am happy to announce the release of the latest issue of the IEEE CIS Newsletter on Cognitive and Developmental Systems (open access, previously names newsletter on Autonomous Mental Development). > This is a biannual newsletter addressing computational modeling of developmental and cognitive processes in natural and artificial organisms, from humans to robots, at the crossroads of cognitive science, developmental psychology, machine intelligence and neuroscience. > > It is available at: https://goo.gl/HQAMsd > > Featuring dialog: > === "Representational redescription: the next challenge?" > == Dialog Initiated by St?phane Doncieux, with responses from Jessica Kosie and Dare Baldwin, Georges Konidaris, Freek Stulp and Timothy Hospedales, Paul Verschure and Giovanni Pezzulo, Frank Guerin, Paul Abelha and Bipin Indurkhya. > == This issue?s dialog explores various challenges of how and why capabilities to change representations could be happening in robots. In particular, contributors discuss how new representations can be formed out of the dynamic interaction between learning algorithms, cognitive architecture and their physical and social embodiment. > > Call for new dialog: > === "Moving Beyond Nature-Nurture: a Problem of Science or Communication? ? > == Dialog initiated by John Spencer, Mark Blumberg and David Shenk > == John Spencer, Mark Blumberg and David Shenk observe that in spite of numerous scientific discoveries supporting the view of development as a complex multi-factored process, the discussions of development in several scientific fields and in the general public are still strongly organized around the nature/nurture distinction. Thus, they ask a crucial question: is this because there is not yet sufficient scientific evidence, or is this because the simplicity of the nature/nurture framework is much easier to communicate (or just better communicated by its supporters)? Those of you interested in reacting to this dialog initiation are welcome to submit a response by April 15th, 2015. The length of each response must be between 600 and 800 words including references (contact pierre-yves.oudeyer at inria.fr ). > > You will also find news about the IEEE CIS CDS Technical Committee and the ICDL-Epirob 2016 conference. > > Let me remind you that previous issues of the newsletter are all open-access and available at: http://icdl-epirob.org/cdsnl > > I wish you a stimulating reading! > > Best regards, > > Pierre-Yves Oudeyer, > > Editor of the IEEE CIS Newsletter on Cognitive and Developmental Systems > Chair of the IEEE CIS AMD Technical Committee on Cognitive and Developmental Systems > Research director, Inria > Head of Flower project-team > Inria and Ensta ParisTech, France > http://www.pyoudeyer.com > https://flowers.inria.fr > http://www.poppy-project.org ======================================================== Professor Ron Sun Cognitive Sciences Department Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute 110 Eighth Street, Carnegie 302A Troy, NY 12180, USA phone: 518-276-3409 fax: 518-276-8268 email: dr.ron.sun [AT] gmail.com web: http://sites.google.com/site/drronsun https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=MD8-GMcAAAAJ&hl=en ======================================================= -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From SWILSON at tcd.ie Tue Jan 5 15:27:27 2016 From: SWILSON at tcd.ie (Simon Wilson) Date: Tue, 5 Jan 2016 20:27:27 +0000 Subject: Connectionists: JOB: Assistant Professor (Lecturer) in Data Science at Trinity College Dublin References: <7BFC7F2A-CBF8-412C-97FF-FEE544A4E510@tcd.ie> Message-ID: <78100F54-2C50-4940-A2F4-E867118DEB4A@tcd.ie> The Discipline of Statistics in the School of Computer Science and Statistics, Trinity College Dublin, is seeking to appoint an Assistant Professor (Lecturer) in Data Science. The closing date for applications is 12:00 GMT on Thursday 10th March 2016. The post is for an initial period of 5 years, with an expectation that the successful candidate will apply for the position to become permanent in the 4th year of the post. This post is one of 40 created under the University's Ussher Assistant Professor scheme to support the delivery of its new Strategic Plan 2014-2019. More information about the post may be found at https://www.tcd.ie/ussher/assets/pdf/Usshers%20-%20Data%20Science.pdf Applications must be made through the College's online application system; see https://www.tcd.ie/ussher/apply/ If you are interested in applying and have questions about the post then please contact me at simon.wilson at tcd.ie. Regards, Simon Wilson -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From boracchi at elet.polimi.it Tue Jan 5 20:01:28 2016 From: boracchi at elet.polimi.it (Giacomo Boracchi) Date: Wed, 6 Jan 2016 02:01:28 +0100 Subject: Connectionists: =?utf-8?q?Final_CFP=3A_=E2=80=9CModel_Complexity?= =?utf-8?q?=2C_Regularization_and_Sparsity=E2=80=9D_Special_Issue_o?= =?utf-8?q?n_IEEE_Computational_Intelligence_Magazine?= Message-ID: Call for Papers IEEE Computational Intelligence Magazine Special Issue on ?Model Complexity, Regularization and Sparsity? http://home.deib.polimi.it/boracchi/events/ModelComplexity.html Aims and Scope The effective management of solution complexity is one of the most important issues in addressing Computational Intelligence problems. Regularization techniques control model complexity by taking advantage of some prior information regarding the problem at hand, represented as penalty expressions that impose these properties on the solution. Over the past few years, one of the most prominent and successful types of regularization has been based on the sparsity prior, which promotes solutions that can be expressed as a linear combination of a few atoms belonging to a dictionary. Sparsity can in some sense be considered a ?measure of simplicity? and, as such, is compatible with many nature-inspired principles of Computational Intelligence. Nowadays, sparsity has become one of the leading approaches for learning adaptive representations for both descriptive and discriminative tasks, and has been shown to be particularly effective when dealing with structured, complex and high-dimensional data. Regularization, including sparsity and other priors to control the model complexity, is often the key ingredient in the successful solution of difficult problems; it is therefore not surprising that these aspects have also recently gained a lot of attention in big-data processing, due to unprecedented challenges associated with the need to handle massive datastreams that are possibly high-dimensional and organized in complex structures. This special issue aims at presenting the most relevant regularization techniques and approaches to control model complexity in Computational Intelligence. Submissions of papers presenting regularization methods for Neural Networks, Evolutionary Computation or Fuzzy Systems, are welcome. Submissions of papers presenting advanced regularization techniques in specific, but relevant, application fields such as data/datastream-mining, classification, big-data analytics, image/signal analysis, natural-language processing, are also encouraged. Topics of Interest ? Regularization methods for big and high-dimensional data; ? Regularization methods for supervised and unsupervised learning; ? Regularization methods for ill-posed problems in Computational Intelligence; ? Techniques to control model complexity; ? Sparse representations in Computational Intelligence; ? Managing model complexity in data analytics; ? Effective priors for solving Computational Intelligence problems; ? Multiple prior integration; ? Regularization in kernel methods and support vector machines. Important Dates ? 22nd January, 2016: Submission of Manuscripts ? 30th March, 2016: Notification of Review Results ? 30th April, 2016: Submission of Revised Manuscripts ? 15th June, 2016: Submission of Final Manuscripts ? November, 2016: Special Issue Publication Submission Process The maximum length for the manuscript is typically 20 pages in single column with double-spacing, including figures and references. Authors of papers should specify in the first page of their manuscripts the corresponding author?s contact and up to 5 keywords. Additional information about submission guidelines and information for authors is provided at the IEEE CIM website. Submission instructions can be found at http://home.deib.polimi.it/boracchi/events/ModelComplexity.html Guest Editors Prof. Cesare Alippi, Dipartimento di Elettronica, Informazione e Biongegneria, Politecnico di Milano, via Ponzio 34/5, Milano, 20133, Italy Dr. Giacomo Boracchi, Dipartimento di Elettronica, Informazione e Biongegneria, Politecnico di Milano, via Ponzio 34/5, Milano, 20133, Italy Dr. Brendt Wohlberg, Theoretical Division, Los Alamos National Laboratory, Los Alamos NM 87545, USA -- Giacomo Boracchi, PhD DEIB - Dipartimento di Elettronica, Informazione e Bioingegneria Politecnico di Milano Via Ponzio, 34/5 20133 Milano, Italy. Tel. +39 02 2399 3467 http://home.dei.polimi.it/boracchi/ -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From eb-ballester at bournemouth.ac.uk Fri Jan 8 11:27:30 2016 From: eb-ballester at bournemouth.ac.uk (Emili Balaguer-Ballester) Date: Fri, 8 Jan 2016 16:27:30 +0000 Subject: Connectionists: PhD position in computational neuroscience: Identification of Metastable Cortical Dynamics Underlying Cognitive Decisions (Bournemouth University-IDIBAPS Barcelona) Message-ID: <8be04bac1f8a4f369b01ce4ad3cddf66@Tremail.bournemouth.ac.uk> PhD position in Computational Neuroscience 'Identification of Metastable Cortical Dynamics Underlying Cognitive Decisions' (Bournemouth University-IDIBAPS Barcelona) A PhD position is available in 3-years fully-funded project 'Identification of Metastable Cortical Dynamics Underlying Cognitive Decisions'; based at Bournemouth University (UK) https://research.bournemouth.ac.uk/centre/interdisciplinary-neuroscience-research/ and at the Biomedical Research Institute August Pi I Sunyer (IDIBAPS, http://www.idibaps.org/en_index.htm, University of Barcelona, Spain). Do we have analysis tools for a reliable identification of the dynamical processes underlying decision-making? This is a fundamental question, touching the very basics of our understanding of neural computation and hence one of the most exciting topics in neuroscience. However, to reconstruct in detail neural dynamics generating cognitive decisions is a major challenge for current methodologies. This would be a highly significant advance; for instance the identification of stable dynamical patterns of activity in hippocampus deserved to win the last Nobel Prize. The aim of the project is to develop innovative approaches designed for the identification of metastable dynamics underlying cognitive decisions. We aim for the fusion of statistical learning approaches to pattern discovery with methods for identifying neural attractor dynamics and neurocomputational modelling. The novel approach will reconstruct neural dynamics during tasks specifically designed at Sanchez-Vives Lab in rodents and in human subjects at the Bournemouth EEG lab. The training possibilities that this interdisciplinary project offers are multiple and relevant in building-up a high-profile as a neuroscientist. The student will benefit from the vibrant scientific environment of neural computation and neurosciences at BU https://research.bournemouth.ac.uk/centre/interdisciplinary-neuroscience-research/ and at the cortical networks lab; embedded in the renowned systems neuroscience network in Barcelona http://www.sanchez-vives.org/. Applicants holding a degree in Physics, Mathematics, Engineering, Computer Science or similar disciplines are welcome. Interest or previous training in neuroscience or laboratory experience and a strong mathematical (dynamical systems, partial differential equations) or machine learning background would be very welcome. The researcher would be based at the Faculty of Science, Bournemouth University, and work with Dr Balaguer-Ballester at the Computational Neuroscience laboratory in the context of the interdisciplinary group for neurosciences; and would spend prolonged periods of time in the Cortical Networks Lab (IDIBAPS, Barcelona) led by Prof Maria Victoria Sanchez-Vives; providing an outstanding opportunity to gain a diverse experience of both neuro-computational and experimental approaches. For formally applying and more information please visit https://research.bournemouth.ac.uk/pgr/funded-phd-studentships-in-the-faculty-of-science-and-technology-2015/ The deadline is on the 29th of February, 2016 BU is a Disability Two Ticks Employer and has signed up to the Mindful Employer charter. Information about the accessibility of University buildings can be found on the BU DisabledGo webpages This email is intended only for the person to whom it is addressed and may contain confidential information. If you have received this email in error, please notify the sender and delete this email, which must not be copied, distributed or disclosed to any other person. Any views or opinions presented are solely those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of Bournemouth University or its subsidiary companies. Nor can any contract be formed on behalf of the University or its subsidiary companies via email. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From marsili at ictp.it Fri Jan 8 12:45:22 2016 From: marsili at ictp.it (Matteo Marsili) Date: Fri, 8 Jan 2016 18:45:22 +0100 Subject: Connectionists: TENURE TRACK POSITION IN QUANTITATIVE LIFE SCIENCES AT ICTP, TRIESTE ITALY In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <940C28AE-4BAF-412C-BCE5-9E666F9D7545@ictp.it> TENURE TRACK POSITION IN QUANTITATIVE LIFE SCIENCES AT THE ABDUS SALAM INTERNATIONAL CENTRE FOR THEORETICAL PHYSICS (ICTP). ICTP is seeking applicants for a new tenure track position in its recently established Quantitative Life Sciences (QLS) research section. We're seeking young brilliant researchers in Quantitative Biology, Systems and Computational Neuroscience or Quantitative Ecology and Evolutionary Biology. The successful applicant will play a significant role the QLS section, promoting cutting-edge research in his/her field of expertise. Detailed description of the position is given below. For further information, please contact qls at ictp.it or visit our website www.ictp.it The deadline is 17 February 2016. ICTP, based in Trieste, Italy, provides a top class multi-disciplinary research environment in theoretical sciences, with cutting edge research, education and training, and it has been a driving force behind global efforts for the advancement of science in the developing world. --------------------------------------------------------- Post Title: Research Officer Domain: Quantitative Life Sciences Grade : P-2 Organizational Unit: ICTP Primary Location: Trieste, Italy Recruitment open to: Internal and external candidates Type of contract: Project Appointment (PA) Annual salary: $ 65,877 Deadline (midnight, Trieste time): 17 February 2016 How to apply http://www.ictp.it/about-ictp/personnel-office/employment.aspx OVERVIEW OF THE FUNCTIONS OF THE POST Under the direct supervision of the Senior Researcher of the Quantitative Life Sciences (QLS) Section the incumbent will initiate and undertake world-class research in the field of Quantitative Life Sciences and assist in the planning and implementation of the scientific activities of the section and in the fulfilment of the Centre's mission. Essential responsibilities include: ? Undertake front-line research in the fields of Quantitative Biology, Systems and Computational Neuroscience, Quantitative Ecology and Evolutionary Biology. ? Organization of seminars, schools, workshops, conferences and topical meetings, and selection of participants. ? Review the applications for postdoctoral work and Associateships, and short-term and long-term visits. ? Teach, as required, in Diploma Course Programs. Collaborate, as appropriate, with the Associates as well as other visitors to the Centre, especially those from developing countries. ? Additional activities that may be required to ensure the success of the Section's work. REQUIRED QUALIFICATIONS EDUCATION ? PhD in Physics or areas related to Quantitative Life Sciences. WORK EXPERIENCE ? At least 2 years of relevant professional experience after the PhD. ? Documented record of excellence in research. SKILLS/COMPETENCIES ? Ability to work in a multicultural environment and as part of a team. LANGUAGES ? Excellent knowledge of English. BENEFITS AND ENTITLEMENTS This is an extra-budgetary position classified as a project appointment with an intended medium term period of employment (5 years). Although having staff member status and enjoying the same benefits, the incumbent will be considered an external applicant if later applying for a regular post. For this post, the net annual remuneration will start at US$ 65,877 and is exempt from income tax. UN Pension plan and medical insurance are provided. HOW TO APPLY Candidates should apply through the website http://www.ictp.it/about-ictp/personnel-office/employment.aspx In addition, candidates should send a curriculum vita and list of publications to the ICTP Personnel Office (email: personnel_office at ictp.it), and should arrange to have three letters of recommendation sent directly by their referees to the ICTP Personnel Office by means of a scanned document topersonnel_office at ictp.it, email address of the ICTP Personnel Office, or by fax to +39-040-22407593, clearly indicating in the subject line "Research Officer post in the QLS Section" and the candidate's name. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From ralph.etiennecummings at gmail.com Thu Jan 7 13:59:44 2016 From: ralph.etiennecummings at gmail.com (Ralph Etienne-Cummings) Date: Thu, 7 Jan 2016 13:59:44 -0500 Subject: Connectionists: Deadline Extended: Telluride Neuromorphic Cognition Engineering Workshop 2016 Message-ID: Call for Topic Area Proposals *Extended Deadline: January 25th, 2016* 2016 Neuromorphic Cognition Engineering Workshop Telluride, Colorado, June 26 ?July 16, 2016 We are now accepting proposals for Topic Areas in the 2016 Telluride Neuromorphic Cognition Engineering Workshop. We support topics and projects in neuromorphic cognition, particularly those that involve solving challenging ?everyday? tasks that incorporate domain-specific knowledge, exploration, prediction, and problem solving. In particular, we are interested in projects that hold promise for addressing Grand Challenge types of problems that do not have strong solutions of any form, neuromorphic or not. These Challenge problems should feature long-duration sensorimotor problems that involve autonomous cognitive decision making. Examples might include tasks such as navigating through an unknown environment to locate an object or reach a desired location, visual and auditory understanding of human actions, adaptively manipulating unknown or complex objects in the service of a task, playing a game requiring inference of hidden information or long-term planning and learning, learning a new language, etc. Proposals aiming to bring to reality the capabilities of hardware technologies and/or state-of-the-art approaches from disciplines such as machine learning are also encouraged. Topic proposals that aim to solve a particular problem using the multidisciplinary experience of participants will be favored over topics that simply gather a large number of people working within a discipline, or using a single technology, or approach. Topic areas for this summer's Telluride Neuromorphic Cognition Engineering Workshop will be chosen from proposals submitted to the organizers. Topic areas can span a large field; we are looking for leadership in planning activities and inviting good people in a field. Although past topic areas have tended to be very broad and discipline-oriented (e.g., cognition, audition, vision, robotics, neural interfacing, neuromorphic VLSI, etc.), application-oriented topic areas (e.g., sensor fusion, game-playing robot, object recognition, sound localization, human robot interaction, etc.) are especially desirable. Topic area leaders will receive housing for themselves and their invitees, and limited travel funds. Topic area leaders will help to define the field of neuromorphic cognition engineering through the projects they pursue and the people they invite. They shape their topic by inviting speakers and project leaders (the invitees) and by initiating topic area project discussions prior to the workshop. Teams of two organizers are required. One of the organizers should be an attendee of a previous Telluride Workshop (in any capacity) and was present at the Workshop for at least one week. Pre-workshop topic area choices and study assignments. Before the workshop begins, each topic area will be required to prepare and distribute study materials that constitute: 1) an introductory presentation (e.g., pptx, video, review paper) of the fundamental knowledge associated with the topic area that everyone at the workshop should be exposed to, and 2) a few critical papers that the participants in the topic area should read before the workshop. The topic area should 3) begin a serious group discussion of the projects (e.g., via Facebook, Skype, email, etc). The maximum 2-page proposals should include: 1. Title of topic area. 2. Names of the two topic leaders, their affiliations, and contact information (email addresses). 3. A paragraph explaining the focus and goals of the topic area. 4. A list of possible specific topic area projects. 5. A list of example invitees (up to six names and institutions). No commitments necessary. 6. Any other material that fits within the two-page limit that will help us make a smart choice. Send your topic area proposal in pdf or text format to org15 at neuromorphs.net with subject line containing "topic area proposal". Proposals must be received by January 25, 2016; proposals received after the deadline may still be considered if space is available. We expect to accept 4-5 topic areas, each with 5 invitees. If your proposal for the topic area is not accepted, we will work with you to see if there is a natural way to include your ideas (and you) into the accepted topic areas. We hope to have significant turn-over each year in the topic areas and leaders to ensure fresh new ideas and participants. See the Institute of Neuromorphic Engineering (www.ine-web.org) for background information on the workshop and neuromorphs.net for past workshop wikis. We look forward to your topic proposals! Deadline: January 25, 2016 The Workshop Directors: Cornelia Ferm?ller (University of Maryland), Ralph Etienne-Cummings (Johns Hopkins Univ.) Shih-Chii Liu (University of Zurich and ETH Zurich), Timmer Horiuchi (University of Maryland), Katalin Gotthard (University of Arizona), Michael Pfeiffer (University of Zurich and ETH Zurich), Francisco Barranco (University of Granada) Former 2007-2012 Workshop Director: Tobi Delbruck (University of Zurich and ETH Zurich) -- Ralph Etienne-Cummings, PhD, FIEEE Professor and Chairman Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering Computational Sensor Motor Systems Lab Laboratory for Computational Sensing and Robotics The Johns Hopkins University Baltimore, MD [image: cid:image001.png at 01CFC064.B58B46A0] -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: image001.png Type: image/png Size: 20171 bytes Desc: not available URL: From pblouw at uwaterloo.ca Thu Jan 7 17:01:43 2016 From: pblouw at uwaterloo.ca (Peter Blouw) Date: Thu, 7 Jan 2016 17:01:43 -0500 Subject: Connectionists: 2nd Call for Applications - 2016 Nengo Summer School Message-ID: Hello! [All details about this school can be found online at http://www.nengo.ca/summerschool] The Centre for Theoretical Neuroscience at the University of Waterloo is inviting applications for our 3rd annual summer school on large-scale brain modeling. This two-week school will teach participants how to use the Nengo software package to build state-of-the-art cognitive and neural models to run in simulation and on neuromorphic hardware. Nengo has been used to build what is currently the world's largest functional brain model, Spaun [1], and provides users with a versatile and powerful environment for designing cognitive and neural systems to run in simulated and real environments. We welcome applications from all interested graduate students, research associates, postdocs, professors, and industry professionals. No specific training in the use of modeling software is required, but we encourage applications from active researchers with a relevant background in psychology, neuroscience, cognitive science, robotics, neuromorphic engineering, computer science, or a related field. For a look at last year's summer school, check out this short video: https://goo.gl/wy4dNC [1] Eliasmith, C., Stewart T. C., Choo X., Bekolay T., DeWolf T., Tang Y., Rasmussen, D. (2012). A large-scale model of the functioning brain. Science. Vol. 338 no. 6111 pp. 1202-1205. DOI: 10.1126/science.1225266. [ http://nengo.ca/publications/spaunsciencepaper] ****Application Deadline: February 15, 2016**** *Format*: A combination of tutorials and project-based work. Participants are encouraged to bring their own ideas for projects, which may focus on testing hypotheses, modeling neural or cognitive data, implementing specific behavioural functions with neurons, expanding past models, or providing a proof-of-concept of various neural mechanisms. Hands-on tutorials, work on individual or group projects, and talks from invited faculty members will make up the bulk of day-to-day activities. A project demonstration event will be held on the last day of the school, with prizes for strong projects! *Topics Covered*: Participants will have the opportunity to learn how to: - build perceptual, motor, and sophisticated cognitive models using spiking neurons - model anatomical, electrophysiological, cognitive, and behavioural data - use a variety of single cell models within a large-scale model - integrate machine learning methods into biologically oriented models - interface Nengo with various kinds of neuromorphic hardware (e.g. SpiNNaker) - interface Nengo with cameras and robotic systems - implement modern nonlinear control methods in neural models - and much more? *Date and Location*: June 5th to June 17th, 2016 at the University of Waterloo, Ontario, Canada. *Applications*: Please visit http://www.nengo.ca/summerschool, where you can find more information regarding costs, travel, lodging, along with an application form listing required materials. If you have any questions about the school or the application process, please contact Peter Blouw (pblouw at uwaterloo.ca). We look forward to hearing from you! -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From jpezaris at gmail.com Thu Jan 7 22:17:42 2016 From: jpezaris at gmail.com (John Pezaris) Date: Thu, 7 Jan 2016 22:17:42 -0500 Subject: Connectionists: AREADNE 2016 Call for Abstracts Message-ID: ****** CALL FOR ABSTRACTS ****** AREADNE 2016 Research in Encoding and Decoding of Neural Ensembles 22-26 June 2016 Nomikos Conference Centre Santorini, Greece Celebrating 10 Years of AREADNE Conferences http://www.areadne.org info at areadne.org INTRODUCTION A fundamental problem in neuroscience is to understand how the activation of neuronal populations gives rise to higher order functions including learning, memory, cognition, perception, action and ultimately conscious awareness. Electrophysiological recordings have revealed considerable information about the firing patterns of single neurons, but it remains largely a mystery how collections of individual neurons interact to perform these functions. Understanding ensemble activity is critical to understanding the brain. CONFERENCE MISSION The AREADNE Conferences have been created to gather global scientific leaders who work on neural ensembles and establish a touch-point for the widely disparate and hybrid field. With a spectacular setting on Santorini, the conferences have been carefully planned to foster discussion and interaction between attendees to encourage the establishment of lasting professional relationships. The meetings continue our efforts to promote systems neuroscience in Greece through creating a world-class forum for cutting-edge research. For 2016, we will be Celebrating Ten Years of AREADNE Conferences! FORMAT AND SPEAKERS The conference will span four days, in morning and early evening sessions. Confirmed speakers include experts in the field of multi-neuron experiment, theory, and analysis (in alphabetic order): Michele Basso Matthias Bethge Rick Born Rosa Cossart James DiCarlo Alexander Ecker Lisa Giocomo Konrad Kording Matthew Larkum Albert Lee John Maunsell May-Britt Moser Stephanie Palmer Xaq Pitkow Michael Roukes Irini Skaliora Stelios Smirnakis Nelson Spruston Michael Stryker Gina Turrigiano CALL FOR ABSTRACTS We are currently soliciting abstracts for poster presentation. Submissions will be accepted electronically, and must be received by 12 Feb 2016. Automated email acknowledgment of submission will be provided, and manual verification will be made a few days after submission. Notification of acceptance will be provided by 15 March 2016. Please see our Call for Abstracts page for additional details and submission templates: http://areadne.org/call-for-abstracts ORGANIZING COMMITTEE Dora Angelaki Nicholas Hatsopoulos, co-chair John Pezaris, co-chair Panayiota Poirazi Thanos Siapas Andreas Tolias FURTHER INFORMATION AND SPECIAL NOTE For further information on AREADNE 2016 please see the conference web site http://www.areadne.org or send email to info at areadne.org. Please note that the timing of the DENDRITES 2016 meeting (http://dendrites2016.gr) in Crete dovetails quite nicely with the AREADNE 2016 meeting in Santorini. -- Dr. J. S. Pezaris AREADNE 2016 Co-Chair Massachusetts General Hospital 55 Fruit Street Boston, MA 02114, USA john at areadne.org From huajin.tang at gmail.com Sat Jan 9 13:20:36 2016 From: huajin.tang at gmail.com (Huajin Tang) Date: Sun, 10 Jan 2016 02:20:36 +0800 Subject: Connectionists: 2nd CFP: IEEE WCCI 2016 Workshop on Neuromorphic Computing and Cyborg Intelligence Message-ID: *2016 IEEE World Congress on Computational Intelligence* July 25-29, 2016 - Vancouver, Canada *International Workshop on* *Neuromorphic Computing and Cyborg Intelligence* *Update:* *High quality workshop papers will be invited to submit their full studies to an upcoming special issue on IEEE Transactions on Cognitive and Developmental Systems!* *Overview* The development of novel data representation and learning approaches from recent advances in neuromorphic systems have shown appealing computational advantages. For example, using neural coding theory to represent the external sensory data, and developing spiking timing based learning algorithm have achieved real-time learning performance, either in neuromorphic computational models or hardware systems. Attributed to the new visual or auditory sensors, neuromorphic hardware has provided a fundamentally different technique for data representation, i.e., asynchronous events rather than frames of images as in main stream recognition algorithms. However, the current neuromorphic information processing algorithms are not comparable to achieve sophisticated features and power learning performance as what machine learning approaches can offer. One promising method is to develop integrated learning models that apply brain-like data presentation and learning mechanisms, e.g., implementing deep learning in neuromorphic systems. Neuromorphic systems also overlap with another framework called cyborg intelligence, combining brain functions with computational machines to achieve the best of both via brain-machine interface. The workshop will target the challenging problems in these areas by reporting new solutions, theoretical and technical advances in neuromorphic computing and cyborg intelligence from the worldwide researchers and engineers. Relevant Topics Cognitive computing and cyborg intelligence Neuromorphic information/signal processing Brain-inspired data representation models Neuromorphic learning and cognitive systems Spike-based sensing and learning Neuromorphic sensors and hardware systems Intelligence for embedded systems Cognition mechanisms for big data Embodied cognition and neuro-robotics Important Dates Submission deadline: 15 January 2016 Notification of acceptance: 15 March 2016 Camera-ready deadline: 15 April 2016 Workshop date: 25 July 2016 Submission Guidelines Prospective authors are invited to submit papers according to the IEEE format. All submissions should follow the specifications of WCCI 2016. Manuscripts will be submitted through the IEEE WCCI 2016 paper submission website and will be subject to the same peer-review procedure as the WCCI2016 regular papers. Accepted contributions will be part of the IJCNN conference proceedings, which will be available in IEEE Xplore. Organizers ? Huajin Tang, Sichuan University, Chengdu, China (htang at scu.edu.cn ) ? Gang Pan, Zhejiang University, China (gpan at zju.edu.cn) ? Arindam Basu, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore ( arindam.basu at ntu.edu.sg) ? Luping Shi, Tsinghua University, China (lpshi at mail.tsinghua.edu.cn ) -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From h.dibeklioglu at gmail.com Fri Jan 8 08:51:07 2016 From: h.dibeklioglu at gmail.com (Hamdi Dibeklioglu) Date: Fri, 8 Jan 2016 14:51:07 +0100 Subject: Connectionists: ECCV 2016 Workshops: Call for Proposals Message-ID: ECCV 2016 Workshops: Call for Proposals Important dates Proposal Deadline: Tuesday, March 1st, 2016 Notification: Friday, April 1st, 2016 Workshop dates: Saturday 8th, Sunday 9th, Sunday 16th, October 2016 Call for proposal We solicit proposals for workshops that will be held together with the 14th European Conference on Computer Vision (ECCV?2016). Workshops will take place on October 10th, 11th and 16th at the same venue as the main conference. We welcome proposals on emerging topics that are anticipated not able to be fully explored in the main conference. The purpose of workshops is to provide a comprehensive forum and encourage in-depth discussion of various technical and application issues in our research field. Workshop registration, venue, as well as proceedings will be handled as part of the main conference by the ECCV organizers. Since both space and time are limited, we expect the selection process to be competitive. The topic coverage, the proposers? credential, the interested audience, and relevance of the topic will all be considered in the selection process. Proposers may be asked to provide additional information, modify part of the proposals, or combine with another one. Since the camera-ready deadline is set to be July 25, 2016, the proposers must come with a submission/review schedule that meets this deadline. Note this year, the ECCV workshops will be coordinated together with the ACM International Conference on Multimedia. So please specifically address in your proposal if your workshop would of interest to the Multimedia research community. Submission guidelines Proposals should be submitted by email to workshops at eccv2016.org by March 1st 2016. The candidate workshop organizers will be notified of the decision on April 1st. Proposals should be in PDF format and include the following information: ? Workshop title. ? Proposers' names, titles, affiliations, and primary contact email. ? Topics that will be covered. ? Relevance to the computer vision community ? Relevance to the multimedia community ? Experience that make the proposers well suited for organizing the workshop. ? Rough program outline (including preference for half- or full-day event, estimated numbers of orals, posters, and invited talks). ? Names and bios of any tentative/confirmed invited speakers ? Anticipated target audience as well as expected number of attendees. ? Description of how this proposal relates to previous workshops at CVPR/ICCV/ECCV (be as specific as possible). ? Any special space or equipment requests. Contact For any questions, please contact the workshop chairs via workshops at eccv2016.org Gang Hua Herv? Jegou http://www.eccv2016.org/ -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From torsello at dsi.unive.it Sun Jan 10 05:24:08 2016 From: torsello at dsi.unive.it (Andrea Torsello) Date: Sun, 10 Jan 2016 11:24:08 +0100 Subject: Connectionists: Call for Participation ISSCN 2nd International Summer School on Complex Networks Message-ID: <1622242.gkGPzKfS3H@patsy> ISSCN 2nd International Summer School on Complex Networks Bertinoro, Italy July 11-15 2016 http://www.dsi.unive.it/isscn/ Complex networks are an emerging and powerful computational tool in the physical, biological and social sciences. They aim is to capture the structural properties of data represented as graphs or networks, providing ways of characterising both the static and dynamic facets of network structure. The topic draws on ideas from graph theory, statistical physics and dynamic systems theory. Applications include communication networks, epidemiology, transportation, social networks and ecology. The aim in the Summer School is to provide an overview of both the foundations and state of the art in the field. Lectures will be presented by intellectual leaders in the field, and there will be an opportunity to interact closely with them during the school. The school will be held in the Bertinoro Residential Centre of the University of Bologna, which is situated in beautiful hills between Ravenna and Bologna. The summer school is aimed at PhD students, and younger postdocs or RA's working in the complex networks area. It will run for 5 days with lectures in the mornings and afternoons, and the school fee includes residential accommodation and meals at the residential centre. List of Lecturers Nuno Ara?jo, Universidade de Lisboa, Portugal Alex Arenas, Universidad Rovira i Virgili, Spain Michele Benzi, Emory University, USA Ernesto Estrada, University of Strathclyde, UK Jesus Gomez Gardenes, University of Zaragoza, Spain Simone Severini, University College London, UK Organizers Andrea Torsello, Universit? Ca' Foscari Venezia, Italy Edwin Hancock, University of York, UK Richard Wilson, University of York, UK Ernesto Estrada, University of Strathclyde, UK Registration Fee: ?750 Registration includes Accommodation in single rooms for 5 nights (10/7/2016 to 14/7/2016), meals and coffee breaks. Application is now open through the schools's website. Deadline for application is March 31st 2016. All applicants will receive results by 15/4/2016. Strong applications can receive positive responses before the application deadline. Applicants must send an expression of interest along with their Curriculum vitae. PhD students can send also a letter from the supervisor in support of their application. Contact: Andrea Torsello -- Andrea Torsello PhD Dipartimento di Scienze Ambientali, Informatica, Statistica Universita' Ca' Foscari Venezia via Torino 155, 30172 Venezia Mestre, Italy Tel: +39 0412348468 Fax: +39 0412348419 http://www.dsi.unive.it/~atorsell From vito.trianni at istc.cnr.it Mon Jan 11 05:49:47 2016 From: vito.trianni at istc.cnr.it (Vito Trianni) Date: Mon, 11 Jan 2016 11:49:47 +0100 Subject: Connectionists: [jobs] Deadline approaching - Postdoctoral position in decentralised cognitive processing in swarms In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <57D93551-4151-4268-9A7E-99B3ADC37B6A@istc.cnr.it> ?apologies for multiple postings? Few days left to apply for a postdoc position in Rome, Italy, at the Institute of Cognitive Sciences and Technologies of the Italian National Research Council (ISTC-CNR) The position is is open within the DICE project (Distributed Cognition Engineering, http://laral.istc.cnr.it/dice-project), with starting date as early as March 2016 (flexible). http://laral.istc.cnr.it/trianni/index.php/2015/12/04/post-doc-position-in-decentralised-cognitive-processing *The strict deadline is January the 20th, 2016* *Eligibility Conditions* The applicant must have obtained a PhD before the submission deadline. The applicant must also own a MsC degree or equivalent in the following areas: Computer Science, Engineering, Mathematics, Physics. Other requirements (not strict) can be found in the Notice of Selection (see Art.3) http://www.istc.cnr.it/sites/default/files/vacancies/bandi/notice_of_selection_ndeg_istc-adr-226-2015-rm.doc *Job Description* The applicant will study cognitive processing in decentralised systems resulting from the interaction among the autonomous agents constituting the system. From a theoretical point of view, the research project requires the identification and characterisation of the population-level dynamics that describe the system behaviour. From a practical point of view, the project requires the design of implementation strategies for multi-agent systems (e.g., swarm robotics systems) in order to precisely reproduce the desired macroscopic dynamics. The candidate will focus on problems involving collective decision-making and categorization. Analytical, modelling and programming skills are required, as the research will involve both theoretical investigations and experimental studies with swarms of robots (Kilobots). The notice of selection and the procedure to be followed for submitting applications is available at the following address: http://www.istc.cnr.it/vacancy/assegno-di-ricerca-n?-2262015-modelli-teorici-e-simulazioni-multi-agente-di-processi-cogniti Instructions in English can be found here: http://www.istc.cnr.it/sites/default/files/vacancies/bandi/notice_of_selection_ndeg_istc-adr-226-2015-rm.doc For any informal enquiry, please contact Vito Trianni . ======================================================================== Vito Trianni, Ph.D. vito.trianni@(no_spam)istc.cnr.it ISTC-CNR http://www.istc.cnr.it/people/vito-trianni Via San Martino della Battaglia 44 Tel: +39 06 44595277 00185 Roma Fax: +39 06 44595243 Italy ======================================================================== From thomas.j.palmeri at Vanderbilt.Edu Sun Jan 10 14:24:04 2016 From: thomas.j.palmeri at Vanderbilt.Edu (Thomas Palmeri) Date: Sun, 10 Jan 2016 13:24:04 -0600 Subject: Connectionists: Postdoctoral Fellowship in Cognitive and Neural Modeling at Vanderbilt University Message-ID: <50B3BD39-DF12-4D96-A454-475A98F2FB26@vanderbilt.edu> Postdoctoral Fellowship in Cognitive and Neural Modeling We are eagerly seeking postdoctoral fellows to join an NEI-funded project on cognitive and neural modeling of visual cognition with Thomas Palmeri, Jeffrey Schall, and Gordon Logan at Vanderbilt University. Candidates have opportunities for research combining cognitive and neural modeling with new data from human behavioral experiments and existing data from monkey neurophysiological experiments. The project aims to link cognitive models of perceptual decision making, categorization, search, and control with neural measures and neural models. See the CatLab web site (catlab.psy.vanderbilt.edu ) for descriptions of projects and links to recent publications. Research facilities include computer workstations and servers, laboratory behavioral testing stations, eye trackers, and a shared 6000-core / 500TB compute cluster at Vanderbilt?s ACCRE. Postdoctoral fellows will also take advantage of the facilities and support provided by the Department of Psychology (www.vanderbilt.edu/psychological_sciences/ ), the Vanderbilt Vision Research Center (my.vanderbilt.edu/vvrc/ ), and the Center for Integrative and Cognitive Neuroscience (cicn.vanderbilt.edu ). Candidates can hold a Ph.D. in psychology, neuroscience, computer science, mathematics, physics, engineering, or related disciplines. Candidates should have demonstrated skills in computer programming and statistical analyses; some background in computational modeling is strongly desired. Start date is negotiable, but preference will be given to candidates who can begin sometime within the next six months. Applications will be reviewed on a rolling basis as they arrive. Salary will be based on the NIH postdoctoral scale. Applicants should send a cover letter with a brief research statement, a CV, and names and email addresses of three references to thomas.j.palmeri at vanderbilt.edu . Thomas Palmeri Department of Psychology Vanderbilt Vision Research Center Vanderbilt University Nashville, TN 37240 thomas.j.palmeri at vanderbilt.edu catlab.psy.vanderbilt.edu -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From thomas.j.palmeri at Vanderbilt.Edu Sun Jan 10 13:53:25 2016 From: thomas.j.palmeri at Vanderbilt.Edu (Thomas Palmeri) Date: Sun, 10 Jan 2016 12:53:25 -0600 Subject: Connectionists: Research Experience for Undergraduates at Vanderbilt (REU Summer 2016) Message-ID: <36E6792A-2B4C-4AD3-BEC9-97261B836477@vanderbilt.edu> (please forward to interested undergraduates) Research Experiment for Undergraduates (REU) at Vanderbilt (Summer 2016) We are looking for outstanding students interested in a Research Experience for Undergraduates (REU) at the CatLab at Vanderbilt University this summer 2016. Our REU is part of an NSF-funded project entitled Perceptual Categorization in Real-World Expertise. This project uses online behavioral experiments to understand the temporal dynamics of perceptual expertise, measuring and manipulating the dynamics of object recognition and categorization at different levels of abstraction and assessing how those dynamics vary over measured levels of expertise, using computational models to test hypotheses about expertise mechanisms. Students have opportunities to work on projects ranging from the development of online experiments, development of analysis routines, and development and testing of computational models. This REU is especially appropriate for students interested in applying to graduate programs in psychology, vision science, cognitive science, or neuroscience. The REU provides a $5000 summer stipend, $500 per week for ten weeks; an additional $150 per week helps offsets the cost of housing and meals; a $250 travel allowance is also provided. REUs are restricted to undergraduate students currently enrolled in a degree program and must be U.S. citizens, U.S. nationals, or permanent residents of the United States. The application deadline is February 15, 2016. See http://catlab.psy.vanderbilt.edu/palmeri/catlab/research-experience-for-undergraduates-summer-2016 for details. ------------- Thomas Palmeri Professor of Psychology co-Director of Scientific Computing 507 Wilson Hall Vanderbilt University thomas.j.palmeri at vanderbilt.edu http://catlab.psy.vanderbilt.edu -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From risto at cs.utexas.edu Mon Jan 11 23:50:11 2016 From: risto at cs.utexas.edu (Risto Miikkulainen) Date: Mon, 11 Jan 2016 22:50:11 -0600 Subject: Connectionists: A new track at GECCO: Complex Systems Message-ID: GECCO 2016 will feature a new track this year called "CS - Complex Systems," which combines and replaces the previous "Artificial Life/Robotics/Evolvable Hardware" and "Generative and Developmental Systems" tracks. The track description and important dates are below. -- Terry Soule and Risto Miikkulainen CS Track Chairs =================================================================== Complex Systems Track (CS) 2016 Genetic and Evolutionary Computation Conference (GECCO 2016) July 20-24, 2016, Denver, Colorado, USA http://gecco-2016.sigevo.org/ Important Dates: Abstract Deadline: January 27, 2016 Submission of Full Papers: February 3, 2016 Conference: 20-24 July, 2016 Track Description: This track invites all papers addressing the challenges of scaling evolution up to real-life complexity. This includes both the real-life complexity of biological systems, such as artificial life models and generative and developmental systems (GDS); and the real-world complexity of physical systems, such as evolutionary robotics and evolvable hardware. Artificial life studies artificial systems (software, hardware, or chemical) with properties similar to those of living systems. There are two main complementary goals: to better understand living systems and to use this understanding to build artificial systems with properties similar to those of living systems, such as behavior, adaptability, developmental or generative processes, evolvability, active perception, communication, self-organization and cognition. This track also welcomes models of problem-solving through (social) agent interaction, emergence of collective phenomena and models of the dynamics of ecological interactions in an evolutionary context. Evolutionary robotics and evolvable hardware studies the evolution of controllers, morphologies, sensors, and communication protocols that can be used to build systems that provide robust, adaptive and scalable solutions to the complexities introduced by working in real-world, physical environments. This track welcomes contributions addressing problems from control to morphology, from single robot to collective adaptive systems. Approaches to incorporating human users into the evolutionary search process are also welcome. Contributions are expected to deal explicitly with Evolutionary Computation, with experiments either in simulation or with real robots. From n.lepora at bristol.ac.uk Mon Jan 11 09:32:06 2016 From: n.lepora at bristol.ac.uk (Nathan Lepora) Date: Mon, 11 Jan 2016 14:32:06 +0000 Subject: Connectionists: [meetings] Living Machines V: Second Call for Papers, Satellite Events and Sponsors Message-ID: Second Call for Papers, Satellite Events and Sponsors Living Machines V: The 5th International Conference on Biomimetic and Biohybrid Systems 18th to 22nd July 2016 http://csnetwork.eu/livingmachines/conf2016 To be hosted at the Dynamic Earth Edinburgh, Scotland In association with the Heriot Watt University and University of Edinburgh Accepted papers will be published in Springer Lecturer Notes in Artificial Intelligence Submission deadline March 11th, 2016 ___________________________________________________________ ABOUT LIVING MACHINES 2016 The development of future real-world technologies will depend strongly on our understanding and harnessing of the principles underlying living systems and the flow of communication signals between living and artificial systems. Biomimetics is the development of novel technologies through the distillation of principles from the study of biological systems. The investigation of biomimetic systems can serve two complementary goals. First, a suitably designed and configured biomimetic artefact can be used to test theories about the natural system of interest. Second, biomimetic technologies can provide useful, elegant and efficient solutions to unsolved challenges in science and engineering. Biohybrid systems are formed by combining at least one biological component?an existing living system?and at least one artificial, newly-engineered component. By passing information in one or both directions, such a system forms a new hybrid bio-artificial entity. The theme of the conference also encompasses biomimetic methods for manufacture, repair and recycling inspired by natural processes such as reproduction, digestion, morphogenesis and metamorphosis. The following are some examples of ?Living Machines? as featured at past conferences: ? Biomimetic robots and their component technologies (sensors, actuators, processors) that can intelligently interact with their environments. ? Active biomimetic materials and structures that self-organize and self-repair. ? Nature-inspired designs and manufacturing processes. ? Biomimetic computers?neuromimetic emulations of the physiological basis for intelligent behaviour. ? Biohybrid brain-machine interfaces and neural implants. ? Artificial organs and body-parts including sensory organ-chip hybrids and intelligent prostheses. ? Organism-level biohybrids such as robot-animal or robot-human systems. ACTIVITIES The main conference will take the form of a three-day single-track oral and poster presentation programme, 20th to 22nd July 2016, hosted at Dynamic Earth, Edinburgh, Scotland. The conference programme will include five plenary lectures from leading international researchers in biomimetic and biohybrid systems, and the demonstrations of state-of-the-art living machine technologies. Agreed speakers are: *Antonio Bicchi*, University of Pisa (robotics, haptics and control systems) *Frank Hirth*, King's College London, Institute of Psychiatry (evolutionary neuroscience) *Yoshihiko Nakamura*, University of Tokyo (biomimetics in humanoids) *Thomas Speck*, Albert-Ludwigs-Universit?t Freiburg (plants and animals as concept generators for biomimetic materials and technologies) *Barbara Webb*, University of Edinburgh (perceptual systems; control of behaviour in insects and robots) The full conference will be preceded by up to two days of Satellite Events hosted by the School of Informatics at the University of Edinburgh. SUBMITTING TO LIVING MACHINES 2016 We invite both full papers and extended abstracts in areas related to the conference themes. All contributions will be refereed and accepted papers will appear in the Living Machines 2016 proceedings which we expect to be published in the Springer-Verlag LNAI Series. Full papers (minimum 8 pages, up to 12 pages) are invited from researchers at any stage in their career and should present significant findings and advances in biomimetic or biohybid research. More preliminary work would be better suited for short papers submission (minimum 4 pages, with a maximum of ten references and no more than three self-citations). Full papers will be accepted for either oral presentation (single track) or poster presentation. Extended abstracts will be accepted for poster presentation only. Authors of the best full papers will be invited to submitted extended versions of their paper for publication in a special issue of the Taylor & Francis journal Connection Science. Satellite events Active researchers in biomimetic and biohybrid systems are invited to propose topics for 1-day or 2-day tutorials, symposia or workshops on related themes to be held 18-19th July at the School of Informatics, University of Edinburgh. Events can be scheduled on either the 18th or the 19th or across both days. Attendance at satellite events will attract a small fee intended to cover the costs of the meeting. There is a lot of flexibility about the content, organisation, and budgeting for these events. Please contact us if you are interested in organising a satellite event! EXPECTED DEADLINES March 11th, 2016 Paper submission deadline April 29th, 2016 Notification of acceptance May 16th, 2016 Camera ready copy July 18-22 2016 Conference SPONSORSHIP Living Machines 2016 is part-sponsored by the Convergent Science Network (CSN) for Biomimetics and Neurotechnology. CSN is an EU FP7 Future Emerging Technologies Co-ordination Activity that also organises two highly successful workshop series: the Barcelona Summer School on Brain, Technology and Cognition (https://bcbt.upf.edu/bcbt15) and the Capocaccia Neuromorphic Cognitive Engineering Workshop ( https://capocaccia.ethz.ch/capo/wiki/2015). The 2016 Living Machines conference will also be hosted and co-sponsored by Heriot Watt University. Call for Sponsors. Other organisations wishing to sponsor the conference in any way and gain the corresponding benefits by promoting themselves and their products to through conference publications, the conference web-site, and conference publicity are encouraged to contact the conference organisers to discuss the terms of sponsorship and necessary arrangements. We offer a number of attractive and good-value packages to potential sponsors. ABOUT THE VENUE Living Machines 2016 will be hosted at Dynamic Earth ( http://www.dynamicearth.co.uk), a 5 star visitor attraction in the heart of Edinburgh?s historic old town, next door the Scottish Parliament and Holyrood Palace. Dynamic Earth is a visitor experience that invites you to take a journey through time to witness the story of planet Earth. Through a series of interactive exhibits, state of the art technology and even a 4D encounter you will feel the heat of a bubbling volcano, face the chill of polar ice, fly across the globe before crash landing in a tropical rainforest. Attendees at the conference will receive a discount voucher to visit the Dynamic Earth exhibit. Workshops will be held at the University of Edinburgh?s School of Informatics in George Square, a short walk from Edinburgh city centre. Organising Committee: Mark Desmulliez, Heriot Watt University (Co-chair) Tony Prescott, University of Sheffield (Co-chair) Nathan Lepora, University of Bristol (Programme Chair) Michael Mangar, University of Edinburgh (Satellite Events Chair) Anna Mura, Universitat Pompeu Fabra (Communications) Paul Verschure, Universitat Pompeu Fabra (International Steering Committee) -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From muftimahmud at gmail.com Tue Jan 12 06:48:51 2016 From: muftimahmud at gmail.com (Mufti Mahmud) Date: Tue, 12 Jan 2016 12:48:51 +0100 Subject: Connectionists: Deadline Approaching: Computationally Intelligent Methods in Neural Information Processing at WCCI2016. Message-ID: Dear All, Apologies for cross posting. I would like to request you to contribute to the special session and/or circulate to your network. The cfp can also be found at https://sites.google.com/site/sessionsonneuro/wcci Many thanks and regards, Mufti *Call for Paper for Special Session on * *Computationally Intelligent Methods in Neural Information Processing* *at the IEEE World Congress on Computational Intelligence (IEEE WCCI) 2016* Organized by: Mufti Mahmud 1-4, ?, Amir Hussain 4, 5, ? 1*NeuroChip Lab, University of Padova, 35131 ? Padova, Italy, *2*Institute of Information Technology, Jahangirnagar University, 1342 ? Dhaka, Bangladesh, *3*Theoretical Neurobiology & Neuroengineering Lab, University of Antwerp, 2610 ? Wilrijk, Belgium, *4*COSIPRA Lab, University of Stirling, FK9 4LA ? Stirling, UK, *5*Anhui University, Hefei, Anhui, 230601 - China* ?*Email: muftimahmud at gmail.com , *?*Email: ahu at cs.stir.ac.uk * *Introduction:* The brain, being the most complex organ in human body, is specialized to process information simultaneously coming from many different sources. The neurons work as basic information processing units in the brain and interconnect to each other to form hierarchical and/or parallel pathways. These pathways are mainly involved in transforming information originated from one or more sources into either action (as in motor movements) or specialized information understood by the brain itself (as in cognitive functions). To have a detailed and better understanding of these biological phenomena two approaches have been practiced by the research community ? experimental and theoretical studies. Also, some theoretical studies are inspired by the nature itself which reframes earlier computational techniques to suggest research on biophysical basis of brain research and its information processing capabilities. Needless to say that most of these studies are results of interdisciplinary research involving medical sciences, life sciences, physical sciences, engineering, and cognitive sciences. *Scope:* The focus of this special session is to address the recent advances in computationally intelligent techniques in processing neural information. Developing intelligent methods capable of deciphering brain?s information processing capability is one the biggest challenges in brain research. The objective of this special session is to provide updated information and a forum for the scientists and researchers who are looking for more relevant information in decoding brain functions using expert and computationally intelligent systems. This special session is expected to attract papers on recent research progress in the area of intelligent methods in processing neural signals. The targeted research topics are, but not limited to, the following: ? Computationally intelligent tools for analysis of Spikes, LFP, EEG, MEG, MRI/fMRI, PET, and fNIRS; ? Computationally intelligent methods for modeling and estimating neural signals; ? Computational intelligence in developing smart BMI and neural prosthesis; ? Biologically inspired methods for pattern analysis in neuronal signals; ? Machine learning methods applied to brain research; *Submission of papers:* Submit IEEE US Letter complaint pdf papers to IEEE CEC 2016, following the steps below: ? Visit http://ieee-cis.org/conferences/cec2016/upload.php ? Provide paper details (i.e., Paper Title, Author(s), PDF file to upload, Abstract, Preferred form of presentation, Main paper focus) ? At '*Main research topic*' or '*Additional research topics'*, select '*8bc. Computationally Intelligent Methods in Neural Information Processing*' from the dropdown list. *Important dates:* ? Paper submission deadline: *15 January 2016* ? Decision notification: *15 March 2016* ? Final paper submission and early registration deadline: *15 April 2016* ? Conference dates: *25-29 July 2016*. -- Mufti Mahmud, PhD ?Postdoctoral Research Fellow NeuroChip Lab - Dept. of Biomedical Sciences University of Padova Via f. Marzolo 3 35131 - Padova, Italy Lab: +39 049 827 5308 Fax: +39 049 827 5301 https://sites.google.com/site/muftimahmud/ -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From muftimahmud at gmail.com Tue Jan 12 06:38:34 2016 From: muftimahmud at gmail.com (Mufti Mahmud) Date: Tue, 12 Jan 2016 12:38:34 +0100 Subject: Connectionists: Application Deadline Approaching: School on Neurotechniques 2016, Padova, Italy Message-ID: Dear All, Sorry for the cross posting. I am glad to communicate that the NeuroChip Laboratory of University of Padova, Italy is organizing a School on Neurotechniques with special emphasis on "Tools for Investigating the Function of Neural Circuits". The school will be held from February 15 ? 19, 2016 and the deadline for application is January 20, 2016. The following topics will be covered in the school: 1. Multi-electrode and multi-transistor arrays 2. Implantable brain probes for acute and chronic recording 3. Transcranic magnetic stimulation 4. Mixed electrophysiology, genetics and behavior approaches 5. Closed-loop electrophysiology and neuromorphic systems 6. Genetically encoded fluorecent probes 7. Signal Analysis 8. Calcium imaging 9. Neuron cultures techniques 10. In vivo electrophysiology Thank you for your attention. Best regards, Mufti Mahmud, PhD Call for participation School on Neurotechniques 2016: The toolbox for investigating the function of neural circuits 15-19 February 2016 NeuroChip Lab, University of Padova, Italy Website: http://www.vassanellilab.eu/school-neurotechniques/ OBJECTIVE Investigating information processing and identifying operational rules of brain neural circuits relies on the capability to selectively record and stimulate multiple neurons within a network. The toolbox of available techniques conceived to meet this need is rapidly expanding. The CSN School on Neurotechniques 2015 will offer an overview on advanced electrical- and light-based recording methods of neuronal excitability, focusing on those that are most relevant for the investigation of neural networks ?in vitro? and ?in vivo? and for application in neuroprosthetics. Techniques derived from information theory for the analysis of neuronal population signals will be presented and practical demonstrations of experimental recording sessions provided. The school targets doctoral students, post-doctoral researchers, scientists working in the related fields. Since the school's topics are interdisciplinary covering neurobiology, neuronal biophysics, microscopy, and electronics, preliminary knowledge in these fields is highly recommended. SPEAKERS Luca Berdondini Italian Institute of Technology, Genova, IT Stefano Ferraina University of Rome ?La Sapienza?, IT Michele Giugliano University of Antwerp, BE Giacomo Indiveri INI, Zurich , CH Jonathan Mapelli University of Modena, IT Marcello Massimini University of Milan , IT Nurmikko Arto Brown University, Providence, USA Tullio Pozzan CNR Rome, IT Themis Prodromakis University of Southampton, UK Roland Thewes University of Berlin, DE Paul Verschure ICREA at Universitat Pompeu Fabra, ES Guenther Zeck NMI at the University of Tuebingen, Reutlingen, DE Ralf Zeitler Venneos, Stuttgart, DE Davide Zoccolan SISSA, Trieste, IT REGISTRATION To apply, please register at ( http://www.vassanellilab.eu/school-neurotechniques/school-neurotechniques-2016/registration/) on or before January 20, 2016. If you have any further questions, please contact silviamaria.lattanzio at unipd.it or stefano.vassanelli at unipd.it The registration is FREE, however, the number of places are limited. The registration is sponsored by the European Commission, Project CSNII csnetwork.eu (GA No 601167, FP7, FET Proactive, Neuro-Bio-Inspired Systems). Travel and accommodation costs are not funded. LOCATION The school will be hosted by the NeuroChip Laboratory, Department of Biomedical Sciences, University of Padova, Via f. Marzolo 3, 35131 - Padova, Italy. The location is very close the city centre and is easily reachable from the railway or bus station of Padova. WHEN February 15-19, 2016. Target audience (N = ~25 active full-time): PhD students, postdoctoral researchers, scientists, members of associated EC CSNII consortia. -- Mufti Mahmud, PhD ?Postdoctoral Research Fellow NeuroChip Lab - Dept. of Biomedical Sciences University of Padova Via f. Marzolo 3 35131 - Padova, Italy Lab: +39 049 827 5308 Fax: +39 049 827 5301 https://sites.google.com/site/muftimahmud/ -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From m.plumbley at surrey.ac.uk Tue Jan 12 06:50:49 2016 From: m.plumbley at surrey.ac.uk (m.plumbley at surrey.ac.uk) Date: Tue, 12 Jan 2016 11:50:49 +0000 Subject: Connectionists: Reader (Associate Professor) in Machine Learning & Computer Vision, Surrey, UK Message-ID: Reader (Associate Professor) in Machine Learning & Computer Vision Centre for Vision, Speech and Signal Processing (CVSSP) University of Surrey, UK http://jobs.surrey.ac.uk/080815 The University offers a unique opportunity for an outstanding research leader to join the Centre for Vision, Speech and Signal Processing (CVSSP). The successful candidate is expected to build a research project portfolio to complement existing CVSSP strengths. The centre seeks to appoint an individual with an excellent research track-record and international profile to lead future growth of research activities in one or more of the following areas: * Machine Learning & Pattern Recognition * Computer Vision * Robot Vision * Big Visual Data Understanding * Machine Intelligence We now seek a strong research leader who can develop the existing activities of CVSSP and exploit the synergetic possibilities that exist within the centre, across the University and regionally with UK industry. You will possess proven management and leadership qualities, demonstrating achievements in scholarship and research at a national and international level, and experience of teaching within HE. -- Prof Mark D Plumbley Professor of Signal Processing Centre for Vision, Speech and Signal Processing (CVSSP) University of Surrey Guildford, Surrey, GU2 7XH, UK Email: m.plumbley at surrey.ac.uk From kyunghyun.cho at nyu.edu Sun Jan 10 14:53:30 2016 From: kyunghyun.cho at nyu.edu (Kyunghyun Cho) Date: Sun, 10 Jan 2016 14:53:30 -0500 Subject: Connectionists: 1st Workshop on Representation Learning for NLP: Call for Papers Message-ID: The 1st Workshop on Representation Learning for NLP ( https://sites.google.com/site/repl4nlp2016/) invites papers of a theoretical or experimental nature on all relevant topics. Relevant topics for the workshop include, but are not limited to, the following areas (in alphabetical order): - Analysis of language using eigenvalue, singular value and tensor decompositions - Distributional compositional semantics - Integration of distributional representations with other models - Knowledge base embedding - Language modeling for automatic speech recognition, statistical machine translation, and information retrieval - Language modeling for logical and natural reasoning - Latent-variable and representation learning for language - Multi-modal learning for distributional representations - Neural networks and deep learning in NLP - The role of syntax in compositional models - Spectral learning and the method of moments in NLP - Language embeddings and their applications Important Dates - Deadline for submission: 8 May 2016 - Notification of acceptance: 5 June 2016 - Deadline for camera-ready version: 22 June 2016 - Early registration deadline (ACL'16): To be announced. - Workshop: 11 August 2016 Submissions Authors should submit a full paper of up to 8 pages in electronic, PDF format, with up to 2 additional pages for references. The reported research should be substantially original. Accepted papers will be presented as posters. Selected papers may also be presented orally at the discretion of the committee. All submissions must be in PDF format and must follow the ACL 2016 formatting requirements. See the ACL 2016 Call For Papers for reference: http://acl2016.org/index.php?article_id=9. Reviewing will be double-blind, and thus no author information should be included in the papers; self-reference that identifies the authors should be avoided or anonymized. Submissions must be made through the Softconf website set up for this workshop: https://www.softconf.com/acl2016/repl4nlp2016/. Style files and other information about paper formatting requirements will be made available on the conference website, http://acl2016.org. Accepted papers will appear in the workshop proceedings, where no distinction will be made on the basis of length or mode of presentation. Organizers - Phil Blunsom, University of Oxford and Google DeepMind - Kyunghyun Cho, NYU - Shay Cohen, University of Edinburgh - Edward Grefenstette, Google DeepMind - Karl Moritz Hermann, Google DeepMind - Laura Rimell, University of Cambridge - Jason Weston, Facebook - Scott Wen-tau Yih, Microsoft Research -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From giacomo.cabri at unimore.it Tue Jan 12 06:20:36 2016 From: giacomo.cabri at unimore.it (Giacomo Cabri) Date: Tue, 12 Jan 2016 12:20:36 +0100 Subject: Connectionists: CfP 2nd Workshop on Distributed Adaptive Systems (DAS) at ICAC 2016 Message-ID: <5694E184.7030102@unimore.it> The 2nd Workshop on Distributed Adaptive Systems (DAS), colocated at the 13th IEEE International Conference on Autonomic Computing (ICAC) Call for papers [DAS at ICAC2016] On the account of the recent advances in technology, computational systems have to be thought as ever growing distributed artificial environments in which requirements, constituent components and user needs dynamically change in unpredictable ways. Coping with such uncertainties represents an interesting challenge for the designer of these systems, specifically regarding how to guarantee adaptivity towards both functional and non-functional requirements, as well as autonomously handling coordination and collaboration aspects among constituent units that have to act as autonomous and heterogeneous agents. These agents more often rely on incomplete information regarding the whole system in which they are integrated, but yet, in order to foster their Self-* properties, they need to discover, learn and evolve their behavior by taking into account how other agents are performing within the considered environment. The purpose of this workshop is therefore to create an useful forum of discussion on how Self-* properties and design & implementation concepts that are nowadays considered in Autonomic Computing literature can be extended and exploited in case of distributed autonomous systems , hence how to create adaptivity as a whole by starting from single autonomous units. Practitioners and researchers are therefore invited to submit interesting contributions both in theoretical work and real world applications so to create a fruitful discussion regarding the presented challenges and the following related topics: Models and Methods for designing DAS Distributed learning and experience sharing among agents Advances in Multi-Agent System coordination Formal methods and languages for distributed adaptive systems Modelling distributed adaptive systems Collectivism in distributed adaptive systems Optimization in distributed adaptive systems Framework and design patterns for distributed adaptive systems Bio-inspired and evolutionary approaches to distributed adaptive systems Tools and simulation software for distributed adaptive systems Case studies and real world applications. Mechanisms and Patterns for decentralized decision making and control Industrial best practices and case studies Surveys and Comparative studies in distributed adaptive systems Important dates Paper Submission March 20, 2016 Notification April 30, 2016 Camera Ready May 8, 2016 Workshop date July 19, 2016 Paper submission All papers must represent original and unpublished work that is not currently under review. Papers will be judged on originality, significance, interest, correctness, clarity, and relevance to the broader community. Papers are strongly encouraged to report on experiences, measurements, user studies, and provide an appropriate quantitative evaluation if at all possible. The maximum number of allowed pages is 6. Submission instruction will follow. Author Kit/Submission Instructions can be found at: http://www.ieee.org/conferences_events/conferences/publishing/templates.html The submission of paper can be done by EasyChair at: https://easychair.org/conferences/?conf=dasicac2016 Accepted papers will be included in the ICAC Workshop 2016 Proceedings, which will be published in IEEE Xplore. Outstanding papers will be recommended for publication in IEEE SMC magazine, special issue, http://www.ieeesmc.org/publications/smc-magazine IET Software, special issue on Software Architectures for Decentralized Adaptive Systems, http://digital-library.theiet.org/files/IET_SEN_DAS_SI_CFP.pdf At least one author of each accepted paper is expected to attend the workshop. Program Chairs Antonio Bucchiarone, Fondazione Bruno Kessler, Trento, Italy bucchiarone at fbk.eu Giacomo Cabri, Universit? di Modena e Reggio Emilia, Modena, Italy giacomo.cabri at unimore.it Nicola Capodieci, Universit? di Modena e Reggio Emilia, Modena, Italy nicola.capodieci at unimore.it Haibin Zhu, Nipissing University, Canada haibinz at nipissingu.ca -- |----------------------------------------------------| | Prof. Giacomo Cabri - Ph.D., Associate Professor | Dip. di Scienze Fisiche, Informatiche e Matematiche | Universita' di Modena e Reggio Emilia - Italia | e-mail giacomo.cabri at unimore.it | tel. +39-059-2058320 fax +39-059-2055216 |----------------------------------------------------| From smyth at ics.uci.edu Tue Jan 12 21:30:06 2016 From: smyth at ics.uci.edu (Padhraic Smyth) Date: Tue, 12 Jan 2016 18:30:06 -0800 Subject: Connectionists: tenured faculty positions at the University of California, Irvine Message-ID: The University of California, Irvine (UCI) currently has campus-wide openings for *tenured* faculty at the Associate or early Full Professor stage. We would like to encourage qualified candidates in areas such as AI, machine learning, computer vision, NLP, as well as related areas such as statistics to apply. UCI is seeking to broaden its research presence in these areas, adding to existing faculty such as Anima Anandkumar, Rina Dechter, Alex Ihler, Charless Fowlkes, Pierre Baldi, Eric Mjolsness, Padhraic Smyth, Mark Steyvers, Babak Shababa, Hal Stern, among others. Additional details are provided below. Candidates in computer science or statistics should apply to https://recruit.ap.uci.edu/apply/JPF03236 and candidates in engineering should apply to https://recruit.ap.uci.edu/apply/JPF03234 *Multiple Tenured Positions: UCI 2016 Midcareer Professor Hiring Initiative* UCI is engaged in ambitious strategic expansion and seeks to hire tenured Associate to early Full Professors with distinguished publication (or creative endeavor) records and upward trajectories in their research profiles. This special initiative is independent of other specific search announcements. We will build on the existing strengths of our faculty campuswide, fortify our commitment to diversity, and consider interdisciplinary, transdisciplinary, and convergent science scholars for hire in general campus units. Currently celebrating its 50th anniversary, the University of California, Irvine is part of the premier public university system in the world. UCI is a member of the Association of American Universities and was recently named by U.S. News & World Report as a top ten public university and by the New York Times as No. 1 among U.S. universities that do the most for low-income students. UCI is located in one of the world?s safest and most economically vibrant communities and is Orange County?s second-largest employer, contributing $4.8 billion annually to the local economy. Applicants are expected to have advanced degrees and publication/creative endeavor records commensurate with appointment levels in each school. For application instructions, please go to https://recruit.ap.uci.edu/apply. Applications received by February 1, 2016 will receive fullest consideration, but we will continue reviewing files until all positions are filled. The University of California, Irvine is an Equal Opportunity/Affirmative Action Employer advancing inclusive excellence. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, disability, age, protected veteran status, or other protected categories covered by the UC nondiscrimination policy. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From nguyensmai at gmail.com Wed Jan 13 03:32:35 2016 From: nguyensmai at gmail.com (Nguyen, Sao Mai) Date: Wed, 13 Jan 2016 09:32:35 +0100 Subject: Connectionists: Lecturer Tenure position in Robotics at Telecom Bretagne Message-ID: The French engineering school Telecom Bretagne has a new opening for a Lecturer position (tenure) in Computer Science and Robotics. *Telecom Bretagne* is one of the most prestigious graduate engineering schools ("Grandes Ecoles ") in *France*. It is a public institution, under the aegis of the Ministry for Industry and is a member of the Institut Mines-Telecom and the Universit? europ?enne de Bretagne (European University of Brittany) . The college trains future *professionals* for careers in *industry*, *services* and *research*. Details about the position can be found here: http://www.telecom-bretagne.eu/about/recruitment/job-offers/lecture-computer-science/ ------------- Job Title: Lecturer in Computer Science ? Location : Telecom Bretagne - Brest campus ? Entity / Department / Lab : Computer Science Department / IHSEV Team ? Position of the immediate supervisor : Head of Computer Science Department MISSIONS Within the framework of guidelines for training and research defined by the school, the successful candidate will work under the responsibility of the Head of the Department, within an educational and multidisciplinary research team and in close collaboration with the services and directorates of the school, the position holder : - Provides, develops and coordinates a set of teachings (lectures, TP, TD, project supervision) and teaching methods (project, face to face or remote) in one or more disciplines (computer science, software engineering, programming) for a varied audience (engineering students, master students, continuing education, continuing education students) - May needs to coordinate or manage activity of one or more internal or external stakeholders in training - Participates in a research program within a team and/or within recognized laboratories, in association with internal partners (Institute, other departments) and/or external (institutional and firms) - Contributes to the fame of the school and the Institute through presentations, conferences, scientific publications and involvement in national and international networks within scientific or professional communities of the economic world - Ensures that he obtains, by industrial contracts, submissions of projects with the Institut Mines-T?l?com and with the local, national or international institutions, the financial, material and human means necessary for the fulfillment of these tasks - Leads the actions needed to promote the scientific and economic exploitation of research results through innovation actions, transfers towards companies (intellectual property, know-how, expertise, entrepreneurship) - Contributes to the dissemination of information on research in the society through popular scientific activities, publications and interventions with the general public - Contributes to the collective smooth running of the school by joining the recommendations, the rules and the constraints and by his participation in the collective missions: juries, promotion and communication actions, forums, cross-functional working groups, decision making or advisory authorities. SPECIFIC CONTEXT OF THE RECRUITMENT Teaching activities - Participate in the teachings of the common trunk / basements in computer science - Participate in specialized courses in the field "Software Systems and Networks" - Participate in educational projects by supervising students on the research themes of the Computer Science Department - The candidate will ensure taking account of "security" aspects in a transverse way in the undertaken teachings. Research activities The candidate will be recruited in the research team IHSEV (Interactions Human-Systems and Virtual Environments), a Lab-STICC team (UMR 6285 CNRS). IHSEV dedicates himself to the application of ICT to develop technological systems allowing people with disabilities, frail or the elderly to mitigate dependences or strengthen social ties. Lead research and innovation activities on one or several of the following themes: smart home, embedded systems, automation protocols, platforms of services, robotics for assistive services, virtualization of networks, algorithmic widely distributed, security of services and networks. Enhance collaboration between the research teams of the IT department and more widely with the other departments. Participate in the development of partnerships, collaborations and contractual relations in his domain, particularly in partnership with industry. QUALIFICATIONS AND SKILLS Required level of training and/or experience - PhD in computer science or telecommunication ; a qualification Section 63 is desirable - State employee belonging to a corps recruited by the means of the Ecole Polytechnique or the alumnus of a Ecole Normale Superieure with professional experience > in 3 years - Degree from an engineering school or equivalent with a professional experience > 5 years Skills and abilities: - Actual abilities and motivations for teaching and research - Capacity of adaptation to the thematic evolutions - Pragmatic and able to apply his knowledge in operational systems or emerging (applied research) - Excellent interpersonal skills and ability to integrate research and teaching teams with multi and inter disciplinary - Ability to work in project mode - Open-mindedness, self-assessment capability - Interest and openness to the business world - Interest and openness to innovation in teaching. Necessary theoretical, technical and practical knowledge to hold the post - Broad-spectrum IT and network training (formation) on the following aspects : programming languages (Java, C, C ++, Python, etc.), programming of networks applications - Very good level in English - Knowledge of the ICT sector - Experience in student supervision within a project-based teaching method Desirable skills - Architectures of computer systems, platforms of services - Computing for embedded systems, operating systems (Android, Linux, etc.), security, multimodal interfaces - Robotics, humanoid robotics, interaction between home automation and robotics - Experience of European projects OBSERVATIONS Position based on the Brest campus Application deadline : *31 January 2016* Date of Recruitment board : *11 February 2016* *---------* Mai NGUYEN, Ph.D. nguyensmai.free.fr Lecturer CNRS LabSTICC Computer Science Department T?l?com Bretagne Technop?le Brest-Iroise CS 83818 29238 Brest Cedex 3 France Tel: +33 2 29 00 16 19 T?l?com Bretagne -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From kyunghyun.cho at nyu.edu Wed Jan 13 16:07:03 2016 From: kyunghyun.cho at nyu.edu (Kyunghyun Cho) Date: Wed, 13 Jan 2016 16:07:03 -0500 Subject: Connectionists: [CFP] RepEval 2016: The 1st Workshop on Evaluating Vector-Space Representations for NLP Message-ID: CALL FOR PAPERS ======================================================================== RepEval 2016: The 1st Workshop on Evaluating Vector-Space Representations for NLP ======================================================================== Mission Statement: To foster the development of new and improved ways of measuring the quality and understanding the properties of vector space representations in NLP. Time & Location: Berlin, Germany, August 12th 2016 (ACL 2016 workshop). Website: https://sites.google.com/site/repevalacl16 ===Motivation=== Models that learn real-valued vector representations of words, phrases, sentences, and even document are ubiquitous in today?s NLP landscape. These representations are usually obtained by training a model on large amounts of unlabeled data, and then employed in NLP tasks and downstream applications. While such representations should ideally be evaluated according to their value in these applications, doing so is laborious, and it can be hard to rigorously isolate the effects of different representations for comparison. There is therefore a need for evaluation via simple and generalizable proxy tasks. To date, these proxy tasks have been mainly focused on lexical similarity and relatedness, and do not capture the full spectrum of interesting linguistic properties that are useful for downstream applications. This workshop challenges its participants to propose methods and/or design benchmarks for evaluating the next generation of vector space representations, for presentation and detailed discussion at the event. Following the workshop, the highest-quality proposals will receive the support of the organizers and participants, and some financial support, to help produce their proposed resource to the highest standard. ===Submissions=== We encourage researchers at all levels of experience to consider contributing to the discussion at RepEval by making a short submission. This can either be as an *analysis* of existing benchmarks or by *proposing* new ones. =Analysis Track= An analysis submission should analyze and discuss the strengths and weaknesses of existing evaluation tasks, providing helpful insights for designers of new tasks. Analysis papers will be reviewed, accepted, and published *before* the proposal track?s camera-ready deadline, so that new task proposals could benefit from these findings. As part of their analysis, papers in this track might like to consider the following questions: What are the pros and cons of existing evaluations? What are the limitations of task-independent representation or its evaluation? Given a specific downstream application, which existing evaluation (or family of evaluations) is a good predictor of performance improvement? Which linguistic/semantic/psychological properties are captured by existing evaluations? Which are not? What methodological mistakes were made in the creation of existing evaluation datasets? The analysis track is *not* limited to these topics. We believe that any manuscript presenting a sound argument on representation evaluation would be a great addition to the workshop. =Proposal Track= A proposal submission should propose a novel method for evaluating representations. It does not have to construct an actual dataset, but it should describe a way (or several optional ways) of collecting one. Proposals are expected to provide roughly 5-10 examples as a proof of concept. In addition, each proposal should explicitly mention: Which type of representation it evaluates (e.g. word, sentence, document) For which downstream application(s) it functions as a proxy Any linguistic/semantic/psychological properties it captures Among other important points, proposals should take the following into consideration: If the task captures some linguistic phenomenon via annotators, what evidence is there that it is robustly observed in humans (e.g., inter-annotator agreement)? How easy would it be for other researchers to accurately reproduce the evaluation (not necessarily the dataset)? Will the dataset be cost-effective to produce? Is a specific family of models expected to perform particularly better (or worse) on the task? In other words, which types of models is this evaluation targeted at? How should the evaluation?s results be interpreted? =Submission Format= Submissions to both tracks should be 2-4 pages of content in ACL format, with an unlimited amount of pages for references. For the proposal track, we encourage shorter content (2-3 pages), leaving more room for examples and their visualization. ===Best Proposal Awards *Sponsored by Facebook AI Research*=== Two proposal-track papers will be selected by a special committee, and awarded financial support for turning their idea into a large-scale high-quality dataset via crowdsourcing or other annotation efforts. We hope that the workshop community?s endorsement will also promote the use of these new evaluations. ===Important Dates=== Submission: May 8th 2016 Notification: June 5th 2016 Camera-Ready (Analysis Track): June 12th 2016 Camera-Ready (Proposal Track): June 26th 2016* Workshop Date: August 12th 2016 *This will give proposal-track authors enough time to go over any relevant results that may rise from the analysis track, and cite them as motivation. ===Organizers=== Omer Levy, Bar-Ilan University Felix Hill, Cambridge University Roi Reichart, Technion - Israel Institute of Technology Kyunghyun Cho, New York University Anna Korhonen, Cambridge University Yoav Goldberg, Bar-Ilan University Antoine Bordes, Facebook AI Research -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From k.g.a.vervaeke at medisin.uio.no Fri Jan 15 13:19:18 2016 From: k.g.a.vervaeke at medisin.uio.no (Koen Gerard Alois Vervaeke) Date: Fri, 15 Jan 2016 18:19:18 +0000 Subject: Connectionists: PhD Fellowship and Postdoc position in systems neuroscience Message-ID: <8A80BF30-F5DB-4E16-ABD9-208C0AB4D3B2@ibv.uio.no> PhD Fellowship and Postdoc position in systems neuroscience These positions are available at the Department of Physiology at the University of Oslo in the lab of Associate Professor Koen Vervaeke for a period of 3 years. These positions are funded by an ERC starting grant and are available from May 2016. For more information about the lab: www.vervaeke-lab.org. Job description We are searching for very motivated candidates with a strong interest in cortical circuits. We study cortical circuit functions in awake behaving mice using either two-photon imaging and genetically encoded Ca2+ indicators or in-vivo whole-cell patching. One project aims to unravel the role of specific neuron types in the barrel cortex while mice perform a sensory perception task. The candidate will use state of the art in vivo two-photon imaging techniques to record neuronal activity, and optogenetic perturbations to identify cell-specific contributions to sensory processing. The second project aims to reveal the functions of the retrosplenial cortex in associative learning and navigation. The candidate will develop new behavior tasks in combination with two-photon imaging or extracellular recording to reveal novel functions of this enigmatic part of the cortex. Qualifications Highly motivated students with a degree in biology, medicine, computer science, physics or engineering are encouraged to apply. It is essential that postdoc candidates have excellent publications in top-tier journals in the field of neuroscience. Ideal applicants should have experience with at least one of the following disciplines; electrophysiology, rodent behavior, two-photon microscopy or optogenetics. The candidates should have steady hands and be creative to trouble-shoot new rodent behavior protocols. Good programming skills (Matlab/LabVIEW), being critical and organized in analyzing data, and experience with microcontrollers (ex. Arduino) are all a big plus. Highly motivated candidates that do not fulfill all the criteria will have the opportunity to learn the necessary skills in the lab, or will spent a training period abroad. Koen Vervaeke www.vervaeke-lab.org www.cinpla.org/people/ Domus Medica, University of Oslo Sogsvannsveien 9, 0372 Oslo, Norway -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From Johannes.Seelig at caesar.de Thu Jan 14 09:36:23 2016 From: Johannes.Seelig at caesar.de (Johannes Seelig) Date: Thu, 14 Jan 2016 14:36:23 +0000 Subject: Connectionists: postdoc and PhD positions Max Planck Research Group Neural Circuits In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: The Max Planck Research Group "Neural Circuits" at the center of advanced european studies and research (caesar) in Bonn, Germany, is looking for postdocs (Reference: Postdoc Neural Circuits 2016) and Ph.D. students (Reference: Ph.D. Neural Circuits 2016). The main focus of Johannes Seelig?s lab is to understand adaptive neural circuits underlying sensorimotor integration and the impact of neuromodulators on these circuits. We apply the latest tools and methods in two photon imaging, optogenetics, and electrophysiology to relate the activity of populations of neurons in behaving animals to computational models of neural circuits. We are looking for candidates with a strong quantitative background in neuroscience, biophysics or related fields (physics, chemistry, engineering, molecular biology). A strong expertise in optical imaging, data analysis, programming, instrumentation, and previous work in a genetic model organism (such as fruit fly or mouse) would be ideal. Caesar is part of a cluster for neuroscience in the Bonn-Cologne region, comprising the universities of Bonn and Cologne, the German Center for Neurodegenerative Diseases and two Max Planck Institutes. The Institute hosts the International Max Planck Research School for Brain & Behavior and is involved in the Bonn International Graduate School of Neuroscience. More information on the group can be found at http://www.caesar.de/seelig.html. Please send an email to johannes.seelig at caesar.de for informal enquiries and/or submit your application at our job portal: www.caesar.de Johannes Seelig research center caesar - center of advanced european studies and research, an associate of the Max Planck Society Ludwig-Erhard-Allee 2 53175 Bonn Germany email: johannes.seelig(at)caesar.de phone: +49 (0)228 9656-190 fax: +49 (0)228 9656-9190 -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From jesus.m.cortes at gmail.com Wed Jan 13 13:42:42 2016 From: jesus.m.cortes at gmail.com (Jesus Cortes) Date: Wed, 13 Jan 2016 19:42:42 +0100 Subject: Connectionists: 2016 QBIO, abstract submission Jan 22 Message-ID: Dear all We are organizing the 2016 Quantitative Biomedicine Workshop One-page abstract (free-format) submission finalizes on Jan 22. Confirmed speakers are: Rafael MOLINA SORIANO (University of Granada) Cesar CABALLERO (BCBL) In?igo GABILONDO (BioCruces) Banafshe LARIJANI (CSIC-UPV/EHU) Markus DAHLEM (Institut fu?r Theoretische Physik-Technische Universita?t Berlin) Paolo BONIFAZI (BioCruces) Eugenio IGLESIAS (BCBL) Mauro D?AMATO (BioCruces) Dante CHIALVO (CONICET) Denis DOORLY (Imperial College London) Alessandro VENEZIANI (Emory) Daniela CALVETTI (Case Western University) For further information visit http://www.bcamath.org/en/workshops/qbio2016 Best Greetings Luca Gerardo-Giorda (BCAM), Sebastiano Stramaglia (University of Bari) and Jesus M Cortes (Biocruces Health Research Institute) -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From ilpincy+ants at gmail.com Thu Jan 14 02:13:33 2016 From: ilpincy+ants at gmail.com (Carlo Pinciroli) Date: Thu, 14 Jan 2016 02:13:33 -0500 Subject: Connectionists: [3rd CFP] ANTS 2016: Tenth International Conference on Swarm Intelligence Message-ID: *** Apologies if you have received this CFP more than once *** ANTS 2016 Tenth International Conference on Swarm Intelligence September 7-9, 2016. Brussels, Belgium Call for papers prepared on October 5, 2015 More details and up-to-date information at http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/ants2016 Scope of the Conference ======================= Swarm intelligence is the discipline that deals with the study of self-organizing processes both in nature and in artificial systems. Researchers in ethology and animal behavior have proposed a number of models to explain interesting aspects of social insect behavior such as self-organization and shape-formation. Recently, algorithms and methods inspired by these models have been proposed to solve difficult problems in many domains. An example of a particularly successful research direction in swarm intelligence is ant colony optimization, the main focus of which is on discrete optimization problems. Ant colony optimization has been applied successfully to a large number of difficult discrete optimization problems including the traveling salesman problem, the quadratic assignment problem, scheduling, vehicle routing, etc., as well as to routing in telecommunication networks. Another interesting approach is that of particle swarm optimization, that mainly focuses on continuous optimization problems. Here too, a number of successful applications can be found in the recent literature. Swarm robotics is another relevant field. Here, the focus is on applying swarm intelligence techniques to the control of large groups of cooperating autonomous robots. ANTS 2016 will give researchers in swarm intelligence the opportunity to meet, to present their latest research, and to discuss current developments and applications. The three-day conference will be held in Brussels, Belgium, on September 7-9, 2016. Relevant Research Areas ======================= ANTS 2016 solicits contributions dealing with any aspect of swarm intelligence. Typical, but not exclusive, topics of interest are: Behavioral models of social insects or other animal societies that can stimulate new algorithmic approaches. Empirical and theoretical research in swarm intelligence. Application of swarm intelligence methods, such as ant colony optimization or particle swarm optimization, to real-world problems. Theoretical and experimental research in swarm robotics systems. Publication Details =================== Conference proceedings will be published by Springer in the LNCS. series. The journal Swarm Intelligence will publish a special issue dedicated to ANTS 2016 that will contain extended versions of the best research works presented at the conference. Further details will soon be published on the web site. Conference Location =================== Auditorium R42.4.502, Solvay Brussels School of Economics and Management, Campus du Solbosch, Universit? Libre de Bruxelles, Av. F.D. Roosevelt 42, 1050 Brussels, Belgium. Best Paper Award ================ A best paper award will be presented at the conference. Further Information =================== Up-to-date information will be published on the web site http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/ants2016/. For information about local arrangements, registration forms, etc., please refer to the above-mentioned web site or contact the local organizers at the address below. Conference Address ================== ANTS 2016 IRIDIA CP 194/6 Tel +32-2-6502729 Universit? Libre de Bruxelles Fax +32-2-6502715 Av. F. D. Roosevelt 50 http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/ants2016 1050 Bruxelles, Belgium email: ants at iridia.ulb.ac.be Important Dates =============== Submission deadline March 2, 2016 Notification of acceptance May 4, 2016 Camera ready copy May 18, 2016 Conference September 7-9, 2016 ANTS 2016 Organizing Committee ============================== General chair Marco Dorigo, Universit? libre de Bruxelles, Belgium Vice-chairs Mauro Birattari, Universit? libre de Bruxelles, Belgium Thomas St?tzle, Universit? libre de Bruxelles, Belgium Technical program chairs Manuel L?pez-Ib??ez, University of Manchester, UK Xiaodong Li, RMIT University, Australia Kazuhiro Ohkura, Hiroshima University, Japan Publication chair Carlo Pinciroli, ?cole Polytechnique de Montr?al, Canada From erik at oist.jp Fri Jan 15 01:45:37 2016 From: erik at oist.jp (Erik De Schutter) Date: Fri, 15 Jan 2016 15:45:37 +0900 Subject: Connectionists: Postdoctoral position in analyzing and modeling dendritic morphology and growth Message-ID: Postdoctoral researcher and staff scientist positions are available in the Computational Neuroscience Unit of Prof. Erik De Schutter at the Okinawa Institute of Science and Technology Graduate University , Japan. We are looking for a postdoc with a (computational) neuroscience background to study the morphology and growth of neuronal dendrites in the olivocerebellar system. We investigate this from the perspective of neuron populations and consider the relations between neighboring dendrites explicitly (Context-aware modeling of neuronal morphologies ). Experience required in either (semi-automated) reconstruction of neural structures or in analysis and modeling of neural morphology. Depending on experience and interest the focus of the research can be analysis of in vivo and EM data and/or modeling the growth of forests of dendrites. You will collaborate with scientists at OIST and abroad in addition to the daily interaction with other researchers and students in the lab who are working on cerebellar modeling projects, analyzing cerebellar recordings or developing software. We offer attractive financial and working conditions in an English language graduate university that emphasizes interdisciplinary research, located on the beautiful subtropical island of Okinawa. Send curriculum vitae, a summary of research interests and experience, and the names of three referees to Prof. Erik De Schutter at erik at oist.jp Prof. Erik De Schutter Computational Neuroscience Unit Okinawa Institute of Science and Technology 1919-1 Tancha, Onna-Son Okinawa 904-0495 JAPAN phone: +81-98-966-8727 fax: +81-98-966-8718 erik at oist.jp http://groups.oist.jp/cnu -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From erdi.peter at wigner.mta.hu Wed Jan 13 19:46:03 2016 From: erdi.peter at wigner.mta.hu (=?ISO-8859-2?Q?=C9rdi_P=E9ter?=) Date: Thu, 14 Jan 2016 01:46:03 +0100 (CET) Subject: Connectionists: study abroad programs in Budapest Message-ID: Dear All: BSCS-US announces its two programs in Budapest for 2016. 1. Our regular program: BSCS - BUDAPEST SEMESTER IN COGNITIVE SCIENCE PHILOSOPHY TO NEUROSCIENCE will be held in the Fall of 2016, see http://www.bscs-us.org/ . 2. We opened also a new program now in its second year: ***************************************** Systems Neuroscience: a study abroad summer program Program start/end dates June 12th- Aug 5th, 2016 The BSCS Systems Neuroscience Program takes place at and academically supervised by the Department of Anatomy, Histology and Embryology, Semmelweis University Medical School, Budapest **************************************** For details, see: http://sysneuro-semester.org/ Inquiry: P?ter ?rdi (SysNeuro Director; BSCS Co-Director) perdi at kzoo.edu bscs at bscs-us.org, jhegedus at kzoo.edu From edizquie at indiana.edu Wed Jan 13 16:51:04 2016 From: edizquie at indiana.edu (Izquierdo, Eduardo J.) Date: Wed, 13 Jan 2016 21:51:04 +0000 Subject: Connectionists: Call for Workshops and Tutorials at Alife Message-ID: <4091390C-1F17-447B-85C6-F4E3B9C24849@indiana.edu> CALL FOR WORKSHOPS AND TUTORIALS The ALife XV Organizing Committee invites proposals for Tutorials and Workshops to be held in conjunction with the Fifteenth International Conference on the Synthesis and Simulation of Living Systems (ALife XV), which will be held in Cancun, Mexico on July 4th-8th, 2016. http://xva.life If accepted, ALife will provide the onsite logistics (seminar rooms, projectors, coffee breaks, and lunches) and links from the main conference website. All other organizational issues ? including separate review process and proceedings publication, if any ? are taken care of by the workshop chairs. Therefore, any workshop-specific requests from participants should be exclusively addressed to them, not to the ALife committee. The internal organization of the satellite workshops and tutorials (website, paper submission, invited talks, proceedings, all deadlines except registration) is entirely left up to their respective organizers. Participation in workshops and tutorials requires conference registration. IMPORTANT DATES Submission of Workshop/Tutorial Proposals is open now. We will receive applications until January 15th, 2016. The notification of acceptance will be given within two weeks of receiving the proposal. Workshop/Tutorial Information and/or submission proposal: workshops at xva.life WORKSHOP PROPOSALS The ALife XV workshops are intended to be forums to present and discuss new approaches, visions, or critical reflections within a research area. They provide an excellent opportunity to meet people with similar interests, to be exposed to cutting-edge research and to exchange ideas in an informal setting. The organizers of an accepted workshop are responsible for its coordination and its publicity (e.g., for sending out call for papers/abstracts), for collecting and reviewing the papers/abstracts, and for maintaining a webpage providing a list of accepted talks. The workshops are typically half day long. The format can be decided by the organizers who are encouraged to plan interactive sessions. TUTORIAL PROCESS ALife XV tutorials will be presented by domain experts to cover current topics relevant to artificial life researchers and practitioners. Each tutorial will be 3 hours long, then we encourage to include into the tutorial also demos and interactive activities. Accepted tutorial?s slide sets will be published on ALife XV website. SUBMISSION PROCESS Each tutorial/workshop proposal should include: 1) title of the workshop/tutorial 2) name(s) and affiliation(s) of the organizer(s)/inspector(s), with relative contact details 3) a short CV of the organizer(s)/instructor(s) 4) a brief description (half-page) of the workshop/tutorial topics Only for workshops: 5) potential target participants and audience 6) roughly approximated number of participants 7) rough estimate of the number of talks All proposals must be sent to: workshops at xva.life Looking forward to your submissions. Best wishes, Eduardo J. Izquierdo, ALife XV Workshop Chair Assistant Professor, Cognitive Science Program, Indiana University -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From ale at sissa.it Thu Jan 14 13:55:50 2016 From: ale at sissa.it (Alessandro Treves) Date: Thu, 14 Jan 2016 19:55:50 +0100 Subject: Connectionists: SISSA encourages young neuroscientists to consider Trieste In-Reply-To: <940C28AE-4BAF-412C-BCE5-9E666F9D7545@ictp.it> References: <940C28AE-4BAF-412C-BCE5-9E666F9D7545@ictp.it> Message-ID: <20160114195550.Horde.g5KZGR8V4mxWl_82W60TR2A@webmail.sissa.it> The International Centre for Theoretical Physics has issued an open call for applications to a tenure track position in Quantitative Life Sciences, which could be filled by a neuroscientist. The Cognitive Neuroscience faculty at SISSA would be delighted to welcome such a colleague to Trieste and to interact in research and training activities, and recommends that potential applicants look at the particularly favorable employment terms offered by ICTP, as a UN body. See the post in Quantitative Life Sciences on http://www.ictp.it/about-ictp/personnel-office/employment.aspx Early deadline February 17! -- Alessandro Treves http://people.sissa.it/~ale/limbo.html SISSA - Cognitive Neuroscience, via Bonomea 265, 34136 Trieste, Italy and Master in Complex Actions http://www.mca.sissa.it/ From ahu at cs.stir.ac.uk Fri Jan 15 10:00:53 2016 From: ahu at cs.stir.ac.uk (Dr Amir Hussain) Date: Fri, 15 Jan 2016 15:00:53 +0000 Subject: Connectionists: Cognitive Computation journal (Springer Nature): Vol.7, No.6 / Dec 2015 Issue [Increased Impact Factor (2014/15) & Table of Contents Alert] Message-ID: Dear Colleagues: (with advance apologies for any cross-postings) Happy New Year! We are delighted to announce the publication of Volume 7, No.6 / Dec 2015 Issue, of (Springer Nature's) Cognitive Computation journal - www.springer .com/12559 ================================================================ Important News: Increased Impact Factor & Six bi-monthly Journal Issues from 2015! ================================================================ As you will know, Cognitive Computation was selected for coverage in Thomson Reuter?s products and services in 2011. Beginning with V.1 (1) 2009, this publication is now indexed and abstracted in: ? Science Citation Index Expanded (also known as SciSearch?) ? Journal Citation Reports/Science Edition ? Current Contents?/Engineering Computing and Technology ? Neuroscience Citation Index? Cognitive Computation received its first Impact Factor (IF) in 2011 The IF for 2014 has increased to 1.44 (with a first five year IF 1.7) - Thomson Reuters Journal Citation Reports? 2014 Many congratulations to the editors, reviewers and authors! Want to be part of the growing success? Visit the journal homepage (http:// springer.com/12559) for instructions on submitting your research. ================================= Quarterly to Bi-monthly Issues, from 2015!! ================================= Due to continuously growing number of high quality submissions, the number of Issues has increased from four (quarterly Issues) to six (bi-monthly Issues) each year, starting Feb 2015! ================================================================= The December 2015 Issue comprises a Special Issue titled: "Dealing with Big Data-Lessons from Cognitive Computing" (the Guest Editorial is available for free download here: http://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s12559-015-9364-6). This is followed by seven regular papers, including an invited paper by Hojjat Adeli et al titled: "Nature Inspired Computing: An Overview and Some Future Directions" (free download available here: http://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s12559-015-9370-8) The full listing of published articles (Table of Contents) for this December 2015 Issue can be viewed here (and also at the end of this message, followed by an overview of the previous Issues/Archive listings): http://link.springer.com/journal/12559/7/6/ A list of the journal's Open Access articles can be found here: *http://link.springer.com/search?query=&search-within=Journal&facet-journal-id=12559&package=openaccessarticles * Other 'Online First' published articles not yet in a print issue can be viewed here: http://www.springerlink.com/content/121361/?Content+Status=Accepted All previous Volumes and Issues of the journal can be viewed here: http://link.springer.com/journal/volumesAndIssues/12559 ======================================== Reminder: Cognitive Computation "LinkedIn" Group: ======================================== To further strengthen the bonds amongst the interdisciplinary audience of Cognitive Computation, we have set-up a "Cognitive Computation LinkedIn group", which has over 800 members already! We warmly invite you to join us at: http://www.linkedin.com/groups?gid=3155048 For further information on the journal and to sign up for electronic "Table of Contents alerts" please visit the Cognitive Computation homepage: http://www.springer.com/12559 or follow us on Twitter at: http://twitter.com/CognComput for the latest On-line First Issues. For any questions with regards to LinkedIn and/or Twitter, please contact Springer's Publishing Editor: Marleen Moore: Marleen.Moore at springer.com Finally, we would like to invite you to submit short or regular papers describing original research or timely review of important areas - our aim is to peer review all papers within approximately six-eight weeks of receipt. We also welcome relevant high quality proposals for Special Issues - two are already planned for 2016 (see: http://www.springer.com/biomed/neuroscience/journal/12559?detailsPage=press ) With our very best wishes to all aspiring readers and authors of Cognitive Computation, for a very happy, healthy, safe and prosperous New Year! Professor Amir Hussain, PhD (Editor-in-Chief: Cognitive Computation) E-mail: ahu at cs.stir.ac.uk (University of Stirling, Scotland, UK) Professor Igor Aleksander, PhD (Honorary Editor-in-Chief: Cognitive Computation) (Imperial College, London, UK) http://www.springer.com/12559 NEW: Open Access Springer Nature/BMC journal: Big Data Analytics ( http://www.bdataanalytics.com/) - Now accepting submissions! NEW: Springer Series on Socio-Affective Computing: http://www.springer.com/series/13199 Also consider your work for related Book Series: SpringerBriefs on Cognitive Computation: http://www.springer.com/series/10374 --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Table of Contents Alert -- Cognitive Computation Vol 7 No 6, December 2015 ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- SPECIAL ISSUE PAPERS: Introduction: Dealing with Big Data-Lessons from Cognitive Computing Ahsan Abdullah, Amir Hussain, Imtiaz Hussain Khan http://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s12559-015-9364-6 An Integrated Qualitative and Quantitative Biochemical Model Learning Framework Using Evolutionary Strategy and Simulated Annealing Zujian Wu, Wei Pang, George M. Coghill http://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s12559-015-9328-x OPEN ACCESS Specific Biomarkers: Detection of Cancer Biomarkers Through High-Throughput Transcriptomics Data Wei Du, Zhongbo Cao, Yan Wang, Fengfeng Zhou, Wei Pang, Xin Chen, Yuan Tian, Yanchun Liang http://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s12559-015-9336-x Sherlock: A Semi-automatic Framework for Quiz Generation Using a Hybrid Semantic Similarity Measure Chenghua Lin, Dong Liu, Wei Pang, Zhe Wang http://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s12559-015-9347-7 OPEN ACCESS Novel Optimization Framework to Recover True Image Data Mohsin Bilal, Hasan Mujtaba, Muhammad Arfan Jaffar http://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s12559-015-9339-7 A Novel Near-Infrared Spectroscopy Based Spatiotemporal Cognition Study of the Human Brain Using Clustering Ahsan Abdullah, Imtiaz Hussain Khan, Abdullah Basuhail, Amir Hussain http://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s12559-015-9358-4 REGULAR PAPERS: Nature Inspired Computing: An Overview and Some Future Directions Nazmul Siddique, Hojjat Adeli http://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s12559-015-9370-8 OPEN ACCESS Bivariate Nonisotonic Statistical Regression by a Lookup Table Neural System Simone Fiori, Tianxia Gong, Hwee Kuan Lee http://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s12559-015-9353-9 A Unified Biologically-Inspired Prediction Framework for Classification of Movement-Related Potentials Based on a Logistic Regression Model Zeng Tang, Jun Lu, Peitao Wang http://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s12559-015-9360-x Development and Implementation of a Wheeled Inverted Pendulum Vehicle Using Adaptive Neural Control with Extreme Learning Machines Junjie Sun, Zhijun Li http://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s12559-015-9363-7 V4 Neural Network Model for Shape-Based Feature Extraction and Object Discrimination Hui Wei, Zheng Dong http://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s12559-015-9361-9 Convergence Proof of Approximate Policy Iteration for Undiscounted Optimal Control of Discrete-Time Systems Yuanheng Zhu, Dongbin Zhao, Haibo He, Junhong Ji http://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s12559-015-9350-z Self-Adaptive Windowing Approach for Handling Complex Concept Drift Imen Khamassi, Moamar Sayed-Mouchaweh, Moez Hammami, Khaled Gh?dira http://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s12559-015-9341-0 ------------------------------------------------ Previous Issues/Archive: Overview: ----------------------------------------------- All previous Volumes and Issues can be viewed here: http://link.springer.com/journal/volumesAndIssues/12559 Alternatively, the full listing of the Inaugural Vol. 1, No. 1 / March 2009, can be viewed here (which included invited authoritative reviews by leading researchers in their areas - including keynote papers from London University's John Taylor, Igor Aleksander and Stanford University's James McClelland, and invited papers from Ron Sun, Pentti Haikonen, Geoff Underwood, Kevin Gurney, Claudius Gross, Anil Seth and Tom Ziemke): http://www.springerlink.com/content/1866-9956/1/1/ The full listing of Vol. 1, No. 2 / June 2009, can be viewed here (which included invited reviews and original research contributions from leading researchers, including Rodney Douglas, Giacomo Indiveri, Jurgen Schmidhuber, Thomas Wennekers, Pentti Kanerva and Friedemann Pulvermuller): http://www.springerlink.com/content/1866-9956/1/2/ The full listing of Vol.1, No. 3 / Sep 2009, can be viewed here: http://www.springerlink.com/content/1866-9956/1/3/ The full listing of Vol. 1, No. 4 / Dec 2009, can be viewed here: http://www.springerlink.com/content/1866-9956/1/4/ The full listing of Vol.2, No. 1 / March 2010, can be viewed here: http://www.springerlink.com/content/1866-9956/2/1/ The full listing of Vol.2, No. 2 / June 2010, can be viewed here: http://www.springerlink.com/content/1866-9956/2/2/ The full listing of Vol.2, No. 3 / Aug 2010, can be viewed here: http://www.springerlink.com/content/1866-9956/2/3/ The full listing of Vol.2, No. 4 / Dec 2010, can be viewed here: http://www.springerlink.com/content/1866-9956/2/4/ The full listing of Vol.3, No.1 / Mar 2011 (Special Issue on: Saliency, Attention, Active Visual Search and Picture Scanning, edited by John Taylor and Vassilis Cutsuridis), can be viewed here: http://www.springerlink.com/content/1866-9956/3/1/ The Guest Editorial can be viewed here: http://www.springerlink.com/content/hu2245056415633l/ The full listing of Vol.3, No.2 / June 2011 can be viewed here: http://www.springerlink.com/content/1866-9956/3/2/ The full listing of Vol. 3, No. 3 / Sep 2011 (Special Issue on: Cognitive Behavioural Systems, Guest Edited by: Anna Esposito, Alessandro Vinciarelli, Simon Haykin, Amir Hussain and Marcos Faundez-Zanuy), can be viewed here: http://www.springerlink.com/content/1866-9956/3/3/ The Guest Editorial for the special issue can be viewed here: http://www.springerlink.com/content/h4718567520t2h84/ The full listing of Vol. 3, No. 4 / Dec 2011 can be viewed here: http://www.springerlink.com/content/1866-9956/3/4/ The full listing of Vol. 4, No.1 / Mar 2012 can be viewed here: http://www.springerlink.com/content/1866-9956/4/1/ The full listing of Vol. 4, No.2 / June 2012 can be viewed here: http://www.springerlink.com/content/1866-9956/4/2/ The full listing of Vol. 4, No.3 / Sep 2012 (Special Issue on: Computational Creativity, Intelligence and Autonomy, Edited by: J. Mark Bishop and Yasemin J. Erden) can be viewed here: http://www.springerlink.com/content/1866-9956/4/3/ The full listing of Vol. 4, No.4 / Dec 2012 (Special Issue titled: "Cognitive & Emotional Information Processing", Edited by: Stefano Squartini, Bj?rn Schuller and Amir Hussain, which is followed by a number of regular papers), can be viewed here: http://link.springer.com/journal/12559/4/4/page/1 The full listing of Vol. 5, No.1 / March 2013 Special Issue titled: Computational Intelligence and Applications Guest Editors: Zhigang Zeng & Haibo He, which is followed by a number of regular papers), can be viewed here: http://link.springer.com/journal/12559/5/1/page/1 The full listing of Vol. 5, No.2 / June 2013 Special Issue titled: Advances on Brain Inspired Computing, Guest Editors: Stefano Squartini, Sanqing Hu & Qingshan Liu, which is followed by a number of regular papers), can be viewed here: http://link.springer.com/journal/12559/5/2/page/1 The full listing of Vol. 5, No.3 / Sep 2013 Special Issue titled: In Memory of John G Taylor: A Polymath Scholar, Guest Editors: Vassilis Cutsuridis & Amir Hussain, which is followed by a number of regular papers), can be viewed here: http://link.springer.com/journal/12559/5/3/page/1 The full listing of Vol. 5, No.4 / Dec 2013, which includes regular papers (including an invited paper by Professor Ron Sun, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, USA, titled: Moral Judgment, Human Motivation, and Neural Networks), and a Special Issue titled: Advanced Cognitive Systems Based on Nonlinear Analysis. Guest Editors: Carlos M. Travieso and Jes?s B. Alonso, can be viewed here: http://link.springer.com/journal/12559/5/4/page/1 The full listing of Vol. 6, No.1 / Mar 2014, can be viewed here: http://link.springer.com/journal/12559/6/1/page/1 The full listing of Vol. 6, No.2 / June 2014, can be viewed here: http://link.springer.com/journal/12559/6/2/page/1 The full listing of Vol. 6, No.3 / Sep 2014, can be viewed here: http://link.springer.com/journal/12559/6/3/page/1 The full listing of Vol. 6, No.4 / Dec 2014 (Special Issue on Modeling emotion, behaviour and context in socially believable robots and ICT interfaces, Guest Editors: Anna Esposito, Leopoldina Fortunati, and Giuseppe Lugano) can be viewed here: http://link.springer.com/journal/12559/6/4/page/1 The full listing of Vol. 7, No.1 / Feb 2015 can be viewed here: http://link.springer.com/journal/12559/7/1/ (with the first six papers part of a Special Issue on "Neural Signal Processing", Guest Edited by: Jordi Sole?-Casals, Francois-Benoit Vialatte, Justin Dauwels. The Guest Editorial titled: "Alternative Techniques of Neural Signal Processing in Neuroengineering" is available (for free download) here: http://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s12559-015-9317-0) The full listing of Vol. 7, No. 2 / April 2015, can be viewed here: http://link.springer.com/journal/12559/7/2/ This comprises a Special Issue on "Sentic Computing", Guest Edited by: E. Cambria and A. Hussain. The Guest Editorial titled: "Sentic Computing" is available (for free download) here: http://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s12559-015-9325-0 The full listing of Vol. 7, No. 3 / June 2015, can be viewed here: http://link.springer.com/journal/12559/7/3/ The full listing of Vol. 7, No. 4 / August 2015, can be viewed here: http://link.springer.com/journal/12559/7/4/ This comprises an invited paper by A. Vinciarelli and A. Esposito, et al. titled: Open Challenges in Modelling, Analysis and Synthesis of Human Behaviour in Human?Human and Human?Machine Interactions, which is followed by six regular papers. The full listing of Vol. 7, No. 5 / October 2015, can be viewed here: http://link.springer.com/journal/12559/7/5/ ------------------------------ The University is ranked in the QS World Rankings of the top 5% of universities in the world (QS World University Rankings, 2014) The University of Stirling is a charity registered in Scotland, number SC 011159. -- The University is ranked in the QS World Rankings of the top 5% of universities in the world (QS World University Rankings, 2014) The University of Stirling is a charity registered in Scotland, number SC 011159. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From ASIM.ROY at asu.edu Thu Jan 14 12:03:29 2016 From: ASIM.ROY at asu.edu (Asim Roy) Date: Thu, 14 Jan 2016 17:03:29 +0000 Subject: Connectionists: Call for Contributions - Frontiers Research Topic - "Representation in the brain" In-Reply-To: <4AD8F84F0AA4E1448BD8131BA7E55EB42B46AD0B@exmbt02.asurite.ad.asu.edu> References: <4AD8F84F0AA4E1448BD8131BA7E55EB42B46AD0B@exmbt02.asurite.ad.asu.edu> Message-ID: <4AD8F84F0AA4E1448BD8131BA7E55EB42B490C76@exmbt02.asurite.ad.asu.edu> Mental representation in the brain remains an unresolved issue. However, there has been significant research in a variety of fields in the last four decades - from neuroscience to theoretical computer science - which can provide new insights on the issue of representation. Frontiers in Psychology, Cognition section, will publish a comprehensive set of articles as an open access e-book, under the title "Representation in the brain," that aims to provide new insights on this decades long question. A more elaborate outline of the Research Topic is available at: http://frontiersin.org/Cognition/researchtopics/Representation_in_the_brain/4398 More than 22 authors from a variety of fields have already committed to submit articles to this Research Topic. All articles will go through the standard Frontiers review process and we expect this e-book to serve as standard reference on this topic in the future. The following are the deadlines: 1. An abstract for the paper is due by January 31, 2016 2. Papers are due by June 30, 2016 With best regards, Guest Editors, Frontiers in Psychology Asim Roy, Arizona State University, USA Leonid Perlovsky, Harvard University and Air Force Research Lab, USA Juyang Weng, Michigan State University, USA Tarek Besold, Free University of Bozen-Bolzano, Italy Jonathan Edwards, University College London, UK From boracchi at elet.polimi.it Sat Jan 16 09:40:09 2016 From: boracchi at elet.polimi.it (Giacomo Boracchi) Date: Sat, 16 Jan 2016 15:40:09 +0100 Subject: Connectionists: Deadline Extended (January 31st): "Concept Drift, Domain Adaptation & Learning in Dynamic Environments" @IEEE IJCNN 2016 Message-ID: CALL FOR PAPERS Special Session on "Concept Drift, Domain Adaptation & Learning in Dynamic Environments" which will be held at IJCNN 2016 (within IEEE WCCI 2016), July 25 - 29, 2016, Vancouver, Canada. http://home.deib.polimi.it/boracchi/events/ijcnn2016_SS/index.html http://www.wcci2016.org/ ********************************************************** Important Announcement ********************************************************** The paper submission deadline of our special session is extended, like IJCNN, till January 31st, 2016 (24:00 EST) ********************************************************** IMPORTANT DATES *Paper submission: January 31st, 24:00 EST (FINAL)* Paper Decision notification: March 15th, 2016 Camera-ready submission: April 15th, 2016 Conference Dates: July 25 - 29th, 2016 *********************************************************** One of the fundamental goals in computational intelligence is to achieve brain-like intelligence, a remarkable property of which is the ability to incrementally learn from noisy and incomplete data, and ability to adapt to changing environments. The special session aims at presenting novel approaches to incremental learning and adaptation to dynamic environments both from the more traditional and theoretical perspective of computational intelligence and from the more practical and application-oriented one. This Special Session aspires at building a bridge between academic and industrial research, providing a forum for researchers in this area to exchange new ideas with each other, as well as with the rest of the neural network & computational intelligence community. **Topics** Papers must present original work or review the state-of-the-art in the following non-exhaustive list of topics: ? Methodologies, algorithms and techniques for learning in dynamic/non-stationary environments ? Incremental learning, lifelong learning, cumulative learning ? Domain adaptation and dataset-shift, covariate-shift adaptation ? Semi-supervised learning methods for handling concept-drift ? Ensemble methods for learning under concept drift ? Learning under concept drift and class unbalance ? Change-detection tests and anomaly-detection algorithms ? Algorithms for information mining in nonstationary datastreams ? Applications that call for learning in dynamic/non-stationary environments, and for incremental learning, such as: o Adaptive classifiers for concept drift and recurring concepts o Intelligent systems operating in dynamic/non-stationary environments o Intelligent embedded and cyber-physical systems ? Applications that call for change and anomaly detection, such as: o fault detection o fraud detection o network-intrusion detection and security o intelligent sensor networks ? Cognitive-inspired approaches to adaptation and learning ? Development of test-sets benchmarks for evaluating algorithms learning in non-stationary/dynamic environments ? Issues relevant to above mentioned or related fields **Keywords** Concept drift, nonstationary environment, change/anomaly detection, domain adaptation, incremental learning, data streams. **Paper Submission** THE DEADLINE FOR THE PAPER SUBMISSION TO THE SPECIAL SESSION IS THE SAME OF IEEE WCCI 2016, and have been *extended to January 31st, 2016, 24:00 EST (FINAL)* All the submissions will be peer-reviewed with the same criteria used for other contributed papers. Perspective authors will submit their papers through the IEEE IJCNN/WCCI 2016 conference submission system at http://www.wcci2016.org/ Please make sure to select the Special Session nr 26 "Concept Drift, Domain Adaptation & Learning in Dynamic Environments" from the "S. SPECIAL SESSION TOPICS" name in the "Main Research topic" dropdown list; Templates and instruction for authors will be provided on the IEEE IJCNN/WCCI webpagehttp://www.wcci2016.org/ All papers submitted to the special sessions will be subject to the same peer-review procedure as regular papers, accepted papers will be published in the conference proceedings. Further information about IEEE IJCNN/WCCI 2016 can be found at http://www.wcci2016.org/ For any question you may have about the Special Session or paper submission, feel free to contact Giacomo Boracchi, giacomo.boracchi at polimi.it *********************************************************** Special Session on: "Concept Drift, Domain Adaptation & Learning in Dynamic Environments" @ IEEE IJCNN/WCCI 2016 **Organizes** . Giacomo Boracchi (Politecnico di Milano, Dipartimento di Elettronica, Informazione e Bioingegneria, Italy) giacomo.boracchi at polimi.it . Robi Polikar (Rowan University, Glassboro, NJ, USA) polikar at rowan.edu . Manuel Roveri (Politecnico di Milano, Dipartimento di Elettronica, Informazione e Bioingegneria, Italy)manuel.roveri at polimi.it . Gregory Ditzler, (University of Arizona, AZ, USA) ditzler at email.arizona.edu **Technical Program Committee** . Alfred Bifet, University of Waikato, New Zealand . Gianluca Bontempi, Universit? Libre de Bruxelles, Belgium . Yaochu Jin, University of Surrey, England, UK . Georg Krempl, University Magdeburg, Germany . Ludmilla Kuncheva, University of Bangor, Wales, UK . Leandro L. Minku, University of Birmingham, UK . Harris Papadopoulos, Frederick University, Cyprus . Leszek Rutkowski, Czestochowa University of Technology, Poland . Shiliang Sun, East China Normal University . Marley Vellasco, Pontif?cia Universidade Cat?lica do Rio de Janeiro, Brasil . Shengxiang Yang, Brunel University, England, UK *********************************************************** -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From ab8556 at coventry.ac.uk Fri Jan 15 12:42:48 2016 From: ab8556 at coventry.ac.uk (Abdulrahman Altahhan) Date: Fri, 15 Jan 2016 17:42:48 +0000 Subject: Connectionists: WCCI2016 Special Session on: Deep Reinforcement Learning References: Message-ID: Dear All, We are organizing a special session in the ranked A conference of IJCNN(International Joint Conference of Neural Networks), the call can be found below. I would like to encourage relevant work to be submitted to this important venue. The World Congress on Computational Intelligence (WCCI2016) July 25-29, 2016 Special Session (IJCNN 44) ?Deep and Reinforcement Learning Models? Deep Learning has been under the focus of neural network research and industrial communities due to its proven ability to scale well into difficult problems and due to its performance breakthroughs over other architectural and learning techniques in important benchmarking problems. This was mainly in the form of improved data representation in supervised learning tasks. On the other hand, Reinforcement learning (RL) is considered the model of choice for problems that involve learning from interaction, where the target is to optimize a long term control strategy or to learn to formulate an optimal policy. Typically these applications involve processing a stream of data coming from different sources, ranging from central massive databases to pervasive smart sensors. Open-questions RL does not lend itself naturally to deep learning and currently there is no uniformed approach to combine deep learning with reinforcement learning despite good attempts. Examples of important open questions are: How to make the state-action learning process deep? And how to make the architecture of an RL system appropriate to deep learning without compromising the interactivity of the system? Although recently there have been important advances in dealing with these issues, they are still scattered and with no overarching framework that promote them in a well-defined and natural way. Aim and objectives This special session aims at providing a unique platform for researchers from Deep Learning and Reinforcement Learning communities to share their research experience towards a unified Deep Reinforcement Learning (DRL) framework in order to allow this important interdisciplinary branch to take-off on solid grounds. In addition to the above open-questions, fundamental questions are bound to be addressed; for example the benefits and drawbacks of methods to combine RL and DL, or how deep DL can be infused into RL? While at the other end, pragmatic questions should be addressed; for example how to harmonize both frameworks to effectively serve on-line big and streamed action data processing application? Contribution is invited for deep learning, reinforcement learning and deep reinforcement learning models. Scope and topics 1. Novel Deep and RL Neural Architectures 2. Adaptation of existing RL Techniques for Deep Learning 3. Optimization and convergence proofs for DRL algorithms 4. Deeply Hierarchical RL 5. Deep and/or RL architecture and algorithms for Control 6. Deep and/or RL architecture and algorithms for Robotics 7. Deep and/or RL architecture and algorithms for Time Series 8. Deep and/or RL architecture and algorithms for Big Streamed Data Processing 9. Deep and/or RL architecture and algorithms for Optimizing Governmental Policy 10. Other Deep and/or RL applications Paper submission: Potential authors may submit their manuscripts for presentation consideration through WCCI2016 submission system. All the submissions will go through peer review. Details on manuscript submission can be found from http://www.wcci2016.org/submission.php Important dates: ? Paper submission deadline: January 31, 2016 ? Notification of acceptance: March 15, 2016 ? Final paper submission and early registration deadline: April 15, 2016 Thank you in advance for your participation Yours sincerely, Abdulrahman Altahhan, Coventry University, UK, ab8556 at coventry.ac.uk Vasile Palade, Coventry University, UK, vpalade453 at gmail.com _______________________________ Dr Abdulrahman Altahhan Lecturer in Computer Science Course Director for MSc in Data Science School of Computing, Electronics and Maths Faculty of Engineering and Computing Coventry University, Coventry CV1 5FB +44 (0) 2477653088 Room EC4 22 -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From dengdehao at gmail.com Sun Jan 17 01:33:23 2016 From: dengdehao at gmail.com (Teng Teck Hou) Date: Sun, 17 Jan 2016 14:33:23 +0800 Subject: Connectionists: [EAIS 2016] - Final extension of paper submission deadline Message-ID: <007e01d150f0$f84af490$e8e0ddb0$@gmail.com> Due to multiple requests, the deadline for paper submission was extended! The new deadline is 25 January 2016, 23:59 BRT (this is the final extension!) (We apologize for multiple copies) - Please distribute this CFP among your colleagues and students 2016 IEEE International Conference on Evolving and Adaptive Intelligent Systems - 2016 IEEE EAIS Natal, Brazil, May 23-25, 2016 Website: http://eventos.ifrn.edu.br/eais2016 * IMPORTANT DATES * -------------------------------------------------------------- Special Session Proposals Deadline: 13 November 2015 Paper Submission Deadline: 25 January 2016 (FINAL DEADLINE EXTENSION!) Decision Notification: 19 February 2016 Final Paper Submission Deadline: 18 March 2016 Authors Registration Deadline: 18 March 2016 All accepted papers will be published in the conference Proceedings and IEEEXplore. Authors of selected papers will be invited to submit extended versions for possible inclusion in a special issue of the Journal Evolving Systems (Springer). Submission page: http://eventos.ifrn.edu.br/eais2016/instructions.html * CONTEXT * -------------------------------------------------------------- The 2016 IEEE Conference on Evolving and Adaptive Intelligent Systems (2016 IEEE EAIS) will be held in Natal (Brazil), a beautiful city located at the Brazil's northeast coast. It is the Brazilian closest capital to/from Europe and Africa. Natal has several tourist attractions and is famous for its natural beauty, for its historical monuments and buildings and for its gorgeous beaches. The city also boasts the second largest urban park in Brazil and was one of the host cities of the 2014 FIFA World Cup. 2016 IEEE EAIS will provide a friendly atmosphere and will be a leading international forum focusing on the discussion of recent advances, the exchange of recent innovations and the outline of open important future challenges in the area of Evolving and Adaptive Intelligent Systems. Over the past decade, this area has emerged to play an important role on a broad international level in today's real-world applications, especially those ones with high complexity and dynamics change. Its embedded modelling and learning methodologies are able to cope with real-time demands, changing operation conditions, varying environmental influences, human behaviors, knowledge expansion scenarios and drifts in online data streams. 2016 IEEE EAIS is organized by the IEEE Technical Committee on Evolving and Adaptive Intelligent Systems, SMC Society. 2016 IEEE EAIS will be held for the first time in Latin America, however, the conference series has a history starting in 2006 in Lake District (England). It was held after that in Witten-Bommerholz (Germany), Nashville (USA), Leicester (England), Paris (France), Madrid (Spain), Singapore, Linz (Austria) and Douai (France). Authors of selected papers will be invited to submit extended versions for possible inclusion in a special issue of the Journal Evolving Systems (Springer). * CALL FOR SPECIAL SESSIONS * -------------------------------------------------------------- Distinguished researchers working in theory, analysis and applications of evolving adaptive and intelligent systems and related areas are encouraged to submit proposals within the technical scope of 2016 IEEE EAIS. Researchers interested in organizing special sessions are invited to submit a formal proposal at the website: http://eventos.ifrn.edu.br/eais2016/special.html * AREAS OF INTEREST * -------------------------------------------------------------- Areas of interest include, but are not limited to: Basic Methologies - Evolving Soft Computing Techniques - Evolving Fuzzy Systems - Evolving Rule-Based Classifiers - Evolving Neuro-Fuzzy Systems - Adaptive Evolving Neural Networks - Online Genetic and Evolutionary Algorithms - Data Stream Mining - Incremental and Evolving Clustering Approaches - Adaptive Pattern Recognition - Incremental and Evolving ML Classifiers - Adaptive Statistical Techniques - Evolving Decision Systems - Big Data - Advanced Concepts Drifts and Shifts in Data Streams - Stability, Robustness, Convergence in Evolving Systems - Online Feature Selection and Dimension Reduction - Online Active and Semi-supervised Learning - Online Complexity Reduction - Computational Aspects - Interpretability Issues - Incremental Adaptive Ensemble Methods - Online Bagging and Boosting - Self-monitoring Evolving Systems - Human-Machine Interaction Issues - Hybrid Modeling - Transfer Learning - Reservoir Computing - Real-world Applications EIS for On-Line Modeling and System Identification - EIS for Time Series Prediction - EIS for Data Stream Mining and Adaptive Knowledge Discovery - EIS in Robotics, Intelligent Transport and Advanced Manufacturing - EIS in Advanced Communications and Multi-Media Applications - EIS in Bioinformatics and Medicine - EIS in Online Quality Control and Fault Diagnosis - EIS in Condition Monitoring Systems - EIS in Adaptive Evolving Controller Design - EIS in User Activities Recognition - EIS in Huge Database and Web Mining - EIS in Visual Inspection and Image Classification - EIS in Image Processing - EIS in Cloud Computing - EIS in Multiple Sensor Networks - EIS in Query Systems and Social Networks - EIS in Alternative Statistical and Machine Learning Approaches * SUBMISSION REQUIREMENTS * -------------------------------------------------------------- Full papers - max. 8 pages IEEE style (double-column). * INTERNATIONAL PROGRAM COMMITTEE * ------------------------------------------------------------------ Plamen Angelov, Lancaster University, UK Dimitar Filev, Ford Motor Co., USA Nikola Kasabov, Auckland University of Technology, New Zealand * ORGANIZING COMMITTEE * ------------------------------------------------------------ Chair: Bruno Sielly Jales Costa, Instituto Federal do Rio Grande do Norte (IFRN), Natal, Brazil Co-chair: Luiz Affonso Guedes, Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Norte (UFRN), Natal, Brazil Publication Chairs: Igor ?krjanc, Slovenia Edwin Lughofer, Austria Local Arrangement Chairs: Arthur S. Medeiros, Brazil Marcus Fernandes, Brazil Clauber G. Bezerra, Brazil Allan M. Martins, Brazil Marcelo Damasceno, Brazil Web & Publicity Chair: Jos? A. Iglesias, Spain Teng Teck Hou, Singapore Special Session Chair: Radu-Emil Precup, Romania Program Committee Chair: Bruno Sielly Jales Costa, Brazil -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From huajin.tang at gmail.com Mon Jan 18 09:58:00 2016 From: huajin.tang at gmail.com (Huajin Tang) Date: Mon, 18 Jan 2016 22:58:00 +0800 Subject: Connectionists: Final CFP: IEEE WCCI 2016 Workshop on Neuromorphic Computing and Cyborg Intelligence Message-ID: *2016 IEEE World Congress on Computational Intelligence* July 25-29, 2016 - Vancouver, Canada *International Workshop on* *Neuromorphic Computing and Cyborg Intelligence* *Update:* The submission deadline is extended until 31 January 2016. There will be no further extension. The workshop papers submission is done through the IEEE CEC 2016 paper submission link, and in the "Main Research Topic", select "8ab: International Workshop on Neuromorphic Computing and Cyborg Intelligence" under Section 8. *High quality workshop papers will be invited to submit their full studies to an upcoming special issue on IEEE Transactions on Cognitive and Developmental Systems!* *Overview* The development of novel data representation and learning approaches from recent advances in neuromorphic systems have shown appealing computational advantages. For example, using neural coding theory to represent the external sensory data, and developing spiking timing based learning algorithm have achieved real-time learning performance, either in neuromorphic computational models or hardware systems. Attributed to the new visual or auditory sensors, neuromorphic hardware has provided a fundamentally different technique for data representation, i.e., asynchronous events rather than frames of images as in main stream recognition algorithms. However, the current neuromorphic information processing algorithms are not comparable to achieve sophisticated features and power learning performance as what machine learning approaches can offer. One promising method is to develop integrated learning models that apply brain-like data presentation and learning mechanisms, e.g., implementing deep learning in neuromorphic systems. Neuromorphic systems also overlap with another framework called cyborg intelligence, combining brain functions with computational machines to achieve the best of both via brain-machine interface. The workshop will target the challenging problems in these areas by reporting new solutions, theoretical and technical advances in neuromorphic computing and cyborg intelligence from the worldwide researchers and engineers. Relevant Topics Cognitive computing and cyborg intelligence Neuromorphic information/signal processing Brain-inspired data representation models Neuromorphic learning and cognitive systems Spike-based sensing and learning Neuromorphic sensors and hardware systems Intelligence for embedded systems Cognition mechanisms for big data Embodied cognition and neuro-robotics Important Dates Submission deadline final extension: 31 January 2016 Notification of acceptance: 15 March 2016 Camera-ready deadline: 15 April 2016 Workshop date: 25 July 2016 Submission Guidelines Prospective authors are invited to submit papers according to the IEEE format. All submissions should follow the specifications of WCCI 2016. Manuscripts will be submitted through the IEEE WCCI 2016 paper submission website and will be subject to the same peer-review procedure as the WCCI2016 regular papers. Accepted contributions will be part of the IJCNN conference proceedings, which will be available in IEEE Xplore. Organizers ? Huajin Tang, Sichuan University, Chengdu, China (htang at scu.edu.cn ) ? Gang Pan, Zhejiang University, China (gpan at zju.edu.cn) ? Arindam Basu, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore ( arindam.basu at ntu.edu.sg) ? Luping Shi, Tsinghua University, China (lpshi at mail.tsinghua.edu.cn ) -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From lpulina at uniss.it Tue Jan 19 04:05:05 2016 From: lpulina at uniss.it (Luca Pulina) Date: Tue, 19 Jan 2016 10:05:05 +0100 Subject: Connectionists: QBFEVAL'16 - Second Call for Solvers & Benchmarks Message-ID: <569DFC41.4070405@uniss.it> [apologies for any cross-posting] ****************************************************************** QBFEVAL'16 - Competitive evaluation of QBF solvers Second Call for Solvers & Benchmarks A joint event with SAT 2016 - The Nineteenth International Conference on Theory and Applications of Satisfiability Testing - Bordeaux, France, July 5-8, 2016 ****************************************************************** QBFEVAL'16 will be the 2016 competitive evaluation of QBF solvers, and the eleventh evaluation of QBF solvers and instances ever. QBFEVAL'16 will award solvers that stand out as being particularly effective on specific categories of QBF instances. The evaluation will run using the computing infrastructure made available by StarExec. We warmly encourage developers of QBF solvers to submit their work, even at early stages of development, as long as it fulfills some very simple requirements. We also welcome the submission of QBF formulas to be used for the evaluation. People thinking about using QBF-based techniques in their area (e.g., formal verification, planning, knowledge reasoning) are invited to contribute to the evaluation by submitting QBF instances of their research problems (see the requirements for instances). The results of the evaluation will be a good indicator of the current feasibility of QBF-based approaches and a stimulus for people working on QBF solvers to further enhance their tools. For questions, comments and any other issue regarding QBFEVAL'16, please get in touch with qbf16 at qbflib.org. Details about solvers and benchmarks submission, tracks, and related rules, are available at http://www.qbflib.org/qbfeval16.php Important Dates Registration open: February 1st 2016 Registration close: February 29th 2016 Solvers participating in competitive tracks due: March 1st 2016 Final versions of solvers participating in competitive tracks due: March 15th 2016 Benchmarks due: March 15th 2016 Solvers participating in non-competitive tracks due: April 30th 2016 Results: presented at SAT'16 Organizing committee Organization Luca Pulina, University of Sassari Judges Hubie Chen, University of the Basque Country and Ikerbasque Martina Seidl, Johannes Kepler Universit?t Linz Christoph Wintersteiger, Microsoft Research Limited -- Luca Pulina, Ph.D. Assistant Professor of Computer Science POLCOMING - Department of Political Science, Communication, Engineering and Information Technologies University of Sassari e-mail lpulina at uniss.it http://sites.google.com/site/lpulina From poirazi at imbb.forth.gr Mon Jan 18 01:37:43 2016 From: poirazi at imbb.forth.gr (Yiota Poirazi) Date: Mon, 18 Jan 2016 08:37:43 +0200 Subject: Connectionists: DENDRITES 2016, June 18-21, Crete: CALL FOR ABSTRACTS Message-ID: <569C8837.5060000@imbb.forth.gr> Dear Colleagues, You are kindly invited to attend the EMBO Workshop on Dendritic Anatomy, Molecules and Function (DENDRITES 2016) in Crete. Dendrites provide the substrate for inter-neuronal communication, and their nonlinear properties play a key role in information processing. Following a very successful meeting in 2014, Dendrites 2016 aims to bring together scientists from around the world to present their research on dendrites, ranging from the molecular to the anatomical and biophysical levels. With the backdrop of an informal yet spectacular setting on Crete, the meeting has been carefully planned not only to satisfy our scientific curiosity but also to foster discussion and encourage interaction between attendees well beyond traditional presentations. In this spirit, the workshop will also provide a soft skills day for the training of young researchers in subjects such as scientific writing/publication issues, fundraising and gender balance. Abstract submission for poster and oral presentation is open until *February 15, 2016*** On behalf of the organizing committee, Yiota Poirazi ------------------------------------------------------- EMBO Workshop on Dendritic Anatomy, Molecules and Function (DENDRITES 2016) Heraklion, Crete, Greece June 18-21, 2016 http://dendrites2016.gr/ _Invited speakers (scientific talks): _ Claudia Clopath Daniel Dombeck Casper Hoogenraad Arthur Konnerth Attila Losonczy Judit Makara Rishikesh Narayanan Elly Nedivi Jackie Schiller Erin Schuman Idan Segev Nelson Spruston Greg Stuart _Invited speakers (Career Issues in academia):_ Monica Di Luca, FENS President: "Publication issues: right time for a reality check" Camilla Belone, FENS-Kavli Scholar: "Retention of women in high levels of neuroscience - Perspectives" Emre Yaksi, FENS-Kavli Scholar: "Funding opportunities in Neuroscience: how to write a successful grant proposal" Matthew Larkum: "How to write an influential scientific publication" *CALL FOR ABSTRACTS* We are soliciting abstracts for oral and poster presentations. We welcome both experimental and theoretical contributions addressing novel findings, methods or databases related to dendrites that fall into one or more of the following domains: * morphological and functional characterizations, * dendritic integration and compartmentalization, * dendritic channel distribution and their functional implications, * molecular pathways and signaling networks, * RNA trafficking and local protein synthesis, * functional or structural plasticity and homeostasis, * the role of dendrites in complex processes, including learning/memory, neural computations etc. Please note that places are limited and subject to availability. Attendees are highly encouraged to submit abstracts for presentations, since presenters will be given priority for registration. Instructions for on-line submission can be found at http://www.dendrites2016.gr/call-for-papers *Important dates * * Abstract submission opens: December 15th, 2016 * Abstract submission closes: February 15th, 2016 * Notification of abstract acceptance: February 29th, 2016 * Notification of oral/poster presentation: early March 2016 _Organizing committee:_ Yiota Poirazi, IMBB-FORTH Michael Hausser, UCL * * Matthew Larkum, Humboldt University IMPORTANT NOTE: The Workshop takes place on the island of Crete and is followed by the AREADNE 2016 meeting (June 22-26th, 2016), focusing on Research in Encoding And Decoding of Neural Ensembles, on the neighboring island of Sandorini. DENDRITES 2016 participants are encouraged to consider attending both meetings. FOR FURTHER INFORMATION Please see the conference web site http://dendrites2016.gr/ or send an email to info at dendrites2016.gr -- Panayiota Poirazi, Ph.D. Director of Research Computational Biology Laboratory Institute of Molecular Biology and Biotechnology (IMBB) Foundation of Research and Technology-Hellas (FORTH) Vassilika Vouton, P.O.Box 1385 GR 711 10 Heraklion, Crete, GREECE Tel: +30 2810 391139 Fax: +30 2810 391101 ?mail: poirazi at imbb.forth.gr http://www.dendrites.gr Chair http://www.fens.org/Outreach/FENS-Kavli-Network-of-Excellence/ -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: not available Type: image/png Size: 115691 bytes Desc: not available URL: From nicosia at dmi.unict.it Sun Jan 17 10:53:41 2016 From: nicosia at dmi.unict.it (Giuseppe Nicosia) Date: Sun, 17 Jan 2016 16:53:41 +0100 Subject: Connectionists: SSBSS 2016 SPEAKERS: 8-14 July 2016, Volterra (Pisa) Tuscany, Italy - 3rd Int. Synthetic & Systems Biology Summer School Message-ID: <1C0BBC6C-B11D-4A54-8841-F2BFFA2A4B55@dmi.unict.it> * Our sincere apologies if you receive multiple copies of this announcement * International Synthetic and Systems Biology Summer School - SSBSS 2016, 8-14 July 2016, Volterra (Pisa) - Tuscany, Italy SSBSS 2016 DEADLINES: Application: March 31, 2016 Notification Acceptance: April 10, 2016 Oral Presentation/Poster Submission: March 31, 2016 Notification of Decision for Oral/Poster Presentation: April 10, 2016 http://www.taosciences.it/ssbss/#application-form SPEAKERS * Yaakov (Kobi) Benenson, Synthetic Biology Group at Department of Biosystems Science and Engineering, ETH Zurich, Basel, Switzerland * Leonidas Bleris, Bioengineering Department, The University of Texas at Dallas, USA * Diego Di Bernardo, Dept of Chemical Materials and Industrial Production Engineering University of Naples "Federico II", Naples, Italy * J. Gootenberg, Feng Zhang's Group, Department of Systems Biology, Harvard Medical School, Harvard University, USA * Markus Herrgard, Technical University of Denmark - Biosustain, Novo Nordisk Foundation Center for Biosustainability, Denmark * Shalev Itzkovitz, Department of Molecular Cell Biology, Weizmann Institute of Science, Israel * Francesco Ricci, Dipartimento di Scienze e Tecnologie Chimiche, University of Rome Tor Vergata, Rome, Italy More speakers will be announced soon! INDUSTRIAL PANEL * TBA ssbss.school at gmail.com http://www.taosciences.it/ssbss/ Previous Editions: SSBSS 2015 http://www.taosciences.it/ssbss2015/ SSBSS 2014 http://www.taosciences.it/ssbss2014/ Other Events in Tuscany: 2nd International Workshop on Machine learning, Optimization & big Data - MOD 2016 August 26-29, 2016 - Volterra (Pisa), Tuscany, Italy http://www.taosciences.it/mod/ Call for Papers: February 28, 2016 http://www.taosciences.it/mod/call-for-papers/ https://easychair.org/conferences/?conf=mod2016 -- Giuseppe Nicosia, Ph.D. Associate Professor of Computer Engineering Dept of Mathematics & Computer Science University of Catania Viale A. Doria, 6 - 95125 Catania, Italy P +39 095 7383048 nicosia at dmi.unict.it http://www.dmi.unict.it/nicosia ================================================================== 3rd International Synthetic & Systems Biology Summer School - SSBSS 2016 * Biology meets Computer Science & Engineering * July 8-14, 2016 - Volterra (Pisa), Tuscany, Italy http://www.taosciences.it/ssbss/ ================================================================== 2nd International Workshop on Machine learning, Optimization & big Data - MOD 2016 August 26-29, 2016 - Volterra (Pisa), Tuscany, Italy http://www.taosciences.it/mod/ ================================================================== -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From nicosia at dmi.unict.it Tue Jan 19 02:47:14 2016 From: nicosia at dmi.unict.it (Giuseppe Nicosia) Date: Tue, 19 Jan 2016 08:47:14 +0100 Subject: Connectionists: CfP: 2nd Int. Workshop on Machine learning, Optimization & big Data - MOD 2016 - Paper submission deadline: February 28, 2016 Message-ID: [Apologies if you receive multiple copies of this announcement] [Please kindly help forward it to potentially interested attendees] 2nd International Workshop on Machine learning, Optimization and big Data - MOD 2016 An Interdisciplinary Workshop: Machine Learning, Optimization and Data Science without BordersTuscany, August 26-29, 2016 http://www.taosciences.it/mod/ modworkshop2016 at gmail.com CALL FOR PAPERS Paper submission deadline: February 28, 2016 http://www.taosciences.it/mod/call-for-papers/ https://easychair.org/conferences/?conf=mod2016 KEYNOTE SPEAKERS + Nello Cristianini, Bristol University, UK + Stephen H. Muggleton, Imperial College London, UK Other Keynote Speakers will be announced soon POST-PROCEEDINGS by Lecture Notes in Computer Science - Springer JOURNAL SPECIAL ISSUE Computational Optimization and Applications Journal - Springer SPECIAL SESSIONS + Deep Learning: Theory, Architectures, Algorithms and Applications + Data-driven Algorithmics ? Data for informed decisions + Multi-Objective Optimization Algorithms The MOD 2016 workshop will consist of four days of workshop sessions and special sessions. We invite submissions of papers, abstracts and posters on all topics related to Machine learning, Optimization and Big Data including real-world applications for the workshop proceedings. MOD 2016 Types of Submissions When submitting a paper to MOD 2016, authors are required to select one of the following four types of papers: + Long paper: original novel and unpublished work (max. 12 pages in Springer LNCS format); + Short paper: an extended abstract of novel work (max. 4 pages); + Work for oral presentation only (no page restriction; any format). For example, work already published elsewhere, which is relevant and which may solicit fruitful discussion at the workshop; + Work for poster presentation only. The poster format for the presentation is A0 (118.9 cm high and 84.1 cm wide, respectively 46.8 x 33.1 inch). For research work which is relevant and which may solicit fruitful discussion at the workshop. MOD 2016 Post-Proceedings All accepted long papers will be published in a volume of the series 'Lecture Notes in Computer Science' from Springer after the Workshop. Instructions for preparing and submitting the final versions (camera-ready papers) of all accepted papers will be available later on. All the other papers (short papers, abstract of the oral presentations, poster presentations) will be published on the MOD 2016 web site. Journal Special Issue on Computational Optimization and Applications Journal The top 8-10 accepted articles will have the opportunity to publish a revised and expanded version of their conference paper in the Computational Optimization and Applications Journal ? Springer. MOD 2016 Submission System All papers must be submitted using EasyChair: https://easychair.org/conferences/?conf=mod2016 The deadline is February 28, 2016 MOD 2016 Important Dates + Paper Submission Deadline: February 28, 2016 + Decision Notification to Authors: May 1st, 2016 + Camera Ready Submission Deadline: June 1st, 2016 + Deadline for early Registration as Presenting Author: June 1st, 2016 + Late registration: June 2 ? August 29, 2016 + On-Site registration: August 26-29, 2016 + MOD 2016 Workshop: August 26-29, 2016 MOD 2016 Program Committee The current MOD 2016 Program Committee includes about 300 confirmed Program Committee members: http://www.taosciences.it/mod/program-committee/ Any questions regarding the submission process can be sent to workshop organizers: modworkshop2016 at gmail.com We look forward to seeing you in Tuscany! Giuseppe Nicosia & Panos Pardalos - MOD 2016 Chairs. http://www.taosciences.it/mod/ modworkshop2016 at gmail.com MOD 2015 Edition: http://www.taosciences.it/mod-2015/MOD 2015 MOD 2015 Keynote Speakers: Vipin Kumar, University of Minnesota, USA Panos Pardalos, University of Florida, USA Tomaso Poggio, MIT, USA -- Giuseppe Nicosia, Ph.D. Associate Professor of Computer Engineering Dept of Mathematics & Computer Science University of Catania Viale A. Doria, 6 - 95125 Catania, Italy P +39 095 7383048 nicosia at dmi.unict.it http://www.dmi.unict.it/nicosia ================================================================== 3rd International Synthetic & Systems Biology Summer School - SSBSS 2016 * Biology meets Computer Science & Engineering * July 8-14, 2016 - Volterra (Pisa), Tuscany, Italy http://www.taosciences.it/ssbss/ ================================================================== 2nd International Workshop on Machine learning, Optimization & big Data - MOD 2016 August 26-29, 2016 - Volterra (Pisa), Tuscany, Italy http://www.taosciences.it/mod/ ================================================================== -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From summer16.isc at uqam.ca Tue Jan 19 09:06:07 2016 From: summer16.isc at uqam.ca (=?Windows-1252?Q?Summer_16_ISC_Montr=E9al?=) Date: Tue, 19 Jan 2016 14:06:07 +0000 Subject: Connectionists: =?windows-1252?q?Summer_School_on_reasoning_-_=C9?= =?windows-1252?q?cole_d=27=E9t=E9_sur_le_raisonnement_=28Montr=E9al=29?= Message-ID: (Version en fran?ais plus bas) Sixth Summer School in Cognitive Science: Reasoning, June 20th to July 1st, Montreal *Currently accepting poster proposals.* - Deadline: January 31st, 2016 - The students presenting the best posters will benefit from free registration to Summer school 2016. - Details: http://summer16.isc.uqam.ca/page/affiche.php?lang_id=2 Reasoning is an important component of our cognitive activity. This theme is a prolific field of interdisciplinary investigation. Many famous researchers will present their investigations at our Summer School 2016. Reasoning will be addressed through the following angles of approach : recent developments in formal logic for the modeling of human reasoning; the experimental study of human heuristics, biases and fallacies; the computational modeling and simulation of reasoning; the neuronal foundations of reasoning; reasoning and cognition; cognitive architectures; reasoning in embodied and distributed cognition; reasoning and perception; reasoning and memory; reasoning and language; reasoning and evolution; logic and computation; the teaching and the learning of logic and arguing skills; reasoning and intelligent tutoring systems; creative inferences, analogies, induction and abduction. Dates: June 20th to July 1st 2016 Place: Institut des sciences cognitives, UQAM, Montr?al, Qu?bec, Canada Organisers: Serge Serge> Robert and the Institut Institut> des Sciences Cognitives . Language: Owing to its international character, the Summer Institute will be held entirely in English. The Institute is intended for: ? graduate and post-graduate students from the participating disciplines: computer science, cognitive science, artificial intelligence, education, psychology (clinicians and researchers), philosophy; ? faculty members, scholars, and professionals from these disciplines; ? anyone interested in the topic. For further information visit the website: www.summer16.isc.uqam.ca Hope to see you there! The Organizing Committee For additional information about the Summer School : http://www.summer16.isc.uqam.ca Speakers * Vinod Goel (York University) * Serge Robert (UQAM) * Ruth M. J. Byrne (Trinity College Dublin) * Geoffrey Goodwin (University of Pennsylvania) * Henry Markovits (UQAM) * David Over (Durham University, UK) * David A. Lagnado (University College London) * Jonathan Evans (Plymouth University, UK) * Linden Ball (University of Central Lancaster, UK) * Valerie Thompson (University of Saskatchewan) * Valerie Reyna (Cornell University) * Wim de Neys (CNRS and Universit? de Paris-Descartes) * Jean-Fran?ois Bonnefon (Toulouse School of Economics) * Guy Politzer (Universit? de Paris 8) * Ulrich Furbach (Koblenz Universit?t) * Keith Stenning (University of Edinburgh) * Michiel van Lambalgen (University of Amsterdam) * Malte Willer (University of Chicago) * Oliver Roy (Universit?t Bayreuth) * Yves Bouchard (Universit? de Sherbrooke) * Paul Thagard (University of Waterloo, Canada) * Guillaume Beaulac (Concordia University) * Craige Roberts (Ohio State University) * Jonathan Ginzberg (Universit? de Paris-Diderot) * Matthew Stone (Rutgers University) * Kristen Syrett (Rutgers University) * Manne Bylund (Stockholm University) * Sangeet Khemlani (Naval Research Laboratory, Washington, D.C.) * Ron Sun (Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, Troy, New York) * Terrence C. Stewart (University of Waterloo, Canada) * Noah D. Goodman (Stanford University) * Jennifer Trueblood (Vanderbilt University) * Jean-Yves B?ziau (Universidade Federal Rio de Janeiro) * Catarina Dutilh Novaes (University of Groningen) * Marco Ragni (Freiburg Universit?t) * Joseph Halpern (Cornell University) * Balakrishnan Chandrasekaran (Ohio State University) * Sheila McIlraith (University of Toronto) * Ian Horrocks (Oxford University) * Pascal Hitzler (Wright State University, Dayton, Ohio) * Helen de Cruz (University of Amsterdam) * Paula Quinon (Lund University) * Susanne Lajoie (McGill University) * Roger Azevedo (North Carolina State University) * Jeroen J. G. van Merrienboer (Maastricht University) * Tassos. A. Mikropoulos (University of Ioannina, Greece) * J. M. De Jong (University of Twente, Netherlands) * Janet L. Kolodner (Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta) * Beverly Woolf (University of Massachusetts, Amherst) * Monique Grandbastien (Universit? de Lorraine) * Cristina Conati (University of British Columbia) * Roger Nkambou (UQAM) Sixi?me ?cole d??t? en sciences cognitives : Le Raisonnement, 20 juin au 1er juillet 2016, Montr?al.. Communications par affiches: appel en cours - Date limite: 31 janvier 2016 - Les ?tudiants qui auront propos? les meilleures affiches se verront offrir l?inscription gratuitement ? l??cole d??t? 2016. - d?tails: http://summer16.isc.uqam.ca/page/affiche.php?lang_id=1 Le raisonnement occupe une place importante dans notre activit? cognitive. Ce th?me constitue un domaine prolifique de recherche interdisciplinaire. De nombreux chercheurs de renom pr?senteront leurs travaux ? notre ?cole d??t? 2016. Le raisonnement y sera abord? sous les angles suivants : les d?veloppements r?cents en logique formelle pour la mod?lisation du raisonnement humain ; l'?tude exp?rimentale des heuristiques humaines, des biais et des sophismes ; les mod?les computationnels et la simulation du raisonnement ; les fondements neuronaux du raisonnement ; le raisonnement et la cognition ; le raisonnement et la perception ; le raisonnement et la m?moire ; le raisonnement et le langage / acquisition des langues ; le raisonnement et l'?volution ; la logique et la computation ; l'enseignement et l?apprentissage de la logique et des habilet?s argumentatives ; les inf?rences cr?atives, les analogies, l?induction et l?abduction. Dates : du 20 juin au 1er juillet 2016 Lieu: Institut des Sciences Cognitives, UQAM, Montr?al, Qu?bec, Canada Organisateurs : Serge Robert et l' Institut des Sciences Cognitives . Langue : ?tant donn?e le public international auquel elle s?adresse, l??cole d??t? se d?roulera en anglais. L??cole d??t? est destin?e : ? aux ?tudiants de cycles sup?rieurs inscrits dans des programmes associ?s aux disciplines participantes : la psychologie du raisonnement, la neuroscience, la logique et la th?orie de la rationalit?, la philosophie de l?esprit et des sciences cognitives, le raisonnement automatique et l?intelligence artificielle, les syst?mes tutoriels intelligents et les technologies ?ducatives, l??ducation ainsi que la linguistique et l?acquisition des langues ; ? aux professeurs, chercheurs et professionnels ?uvrant dans ces disciplines ; ? ? toute personne int?ress?e par le sujet. Pour plus de d?tails consultez le site : www.summer16.isc.uqam.ca Au plaisir de vous y voir ! Le comit? organisateur http://www.summer16.isc.uqam.ca Conf?renciers * Vinod Goel (York University) * Serge Robert (UQAM) * Ruth M. J. Byrne (Trinity College Dublin) * Geoffrey Goodwin (University of Pennsylvania) * Henry Markovits (UQAM) * David Over (Durham University, UK) * David A. Lagnado (University College London) * Jonathan Evans (Plymouth University, UK) * Linden Ball (University of Central Lancaster, UK) * Valerie Thompson (University of Saskatchewan) * Valerie Reyna (Cornell University) * Wim de Neys (CNRS and Universit? de Paris-Descartes) * Jean-Fran?ois Bonnefon (Toulouse School of Economics) * Guy Politzer (Universit? de Paris 8) * Ulrich Furbach (Koblenz Universit?t) * Keith Stenning (University of Edinburgh) * Michiel van Lambalgen (University of Amsterdam) * Malte Willer (University of Chicago) * Oliver Roy (Universit?t Bayreuth) * Yves Bouchard (Universit? de Sherbrooke) * Paul Thagard (University of Waterloo, Canada) * Guillaume Beaulac (Concordia University) * Craige Roberts (Ohio State University) * Jonathan Ginzberg (Universit? de Paris-Diderot) * Matthew Stone (Rutgers University) * Kristen Syrett (Rutgers University) * Manne Bylund (Stockholm University) * Sangeet Khemlani (Naval Research Laboratory, Washington, D.C.) * Ron Sun (Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, Troy, New York) * Terrence C. Stewart (University of Waterloo, Canada) * Noah D. Goodman (Stanford University) * Jennifer Trueblood (Vanderbilt University) * Jean-Yves B?ziau (Universidade Federal Rio de Janeiro) * Catarina Dutilh Novaes (University of Groningen) * Marco Ragni (Freiburg Universit?t) * Joseph Halpern (Cornell University) * Balakrishnan Chandrasekaran (Ohio State University) * Sheila McIlraith (University of Toronto) * Ian Horrocks (Oxford University) * Pascal Hitzler (Wright State University, Dayton, Ohio) * Helen de Cruz (University of Amsterdam) * Paula Quinon (Lund University) * Susanne Lajoie (McGill University) * Roger Azevedo (North Carolina State University) * Jeroen J. G. van Merrienboer (Maastricht University) * Tassos. A. Mikropoulos (University of Ioannina, Greece) * J. M. De Jong (University of Twente, Netherlands) * Janet L. Kolodner (Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta) * Beverly Woolf (University of Massachusetts, Amherst) * Monique Grandbastien (Universit? de Lorraine) * Cristina Conati (University of British Columbia) * Roger Nkambou (UQAM) From xwe at cis.upenn.edu Sun Jan 24 18:38:10 2016 From: xwe at cis.upenn.edu (Wei Xu) Date: Sun, 24 Jan 2016 18:38:10 -0500 Subject: Connectionists: CFP - Speech, Language and Learning: Mid-Atlantic Student Colloquium Message-ID: Mid-Atlantic Student Colloquium on Speech, Language and Learning April 1st, 2016 University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia http://www.mascsll.org/ The fourth annual Mid-Atlantic Student Colloquium on Speech, Language and Learning will be hosted at the University of Pennsylvania (Philadelphia, PA) on April 1, 2016. The Student Colloquium is intended to bring together students taking computational approaches to speech, language, and learning, so that they can introduce their research to the local student community, give and receive feedback, and engage each other in collaborative discussion. Students are encouraged to submit abstracts describing ongoing, planned, or completed research projects, including previously published results and negative results. Student research in any field applying computational methods to any aspect of human language, including speech and learning, from all areas of computer science, linguistics, engineering, neuroscience, information science, and related fields, is welcome. Submissions and presentations must be made by students or postdocs. All accepted submissions will be presented as posters and some will also be invited for short oral presentations. There will be no registration fee. Students and postdocs are encouraged to consult with their supervisors about potential reimbursement of travel expenses. Abstract Submission Details Abstracts should be no more than one page, not including references. Abstracts should conform to ACL style guidelines. LaTeX and Word style files, along with a style guide, are available at the 2015 ACL publications page. Abstract reviewing will not be blind. Please include all names and affiliations in the abstract. Submit your abstract online via the 2016 MASC-SLL easychair site. Topics - Computational models of human language processing - Computational phonology and morphology - Discourse and pragmatics - Evaluation - Information retrieval and question answering - Knowledge Base population and machne reading - Language acquisition - Language disorders - Language generation and summarization - Language resources and annotation - Lexical semantics and ontologies - Machine learning - Machine translation and multilingual processing - NLP for the Web and social media - Semantics - Sentiment analysis and opinion mining - Speaker variability - Speech recognition and synthesis - Syntax and parsing - Text and document classification - Text mining and information extraction Important Dates - Submission deadline (abstracts): February 19 - Decisions announced: March 1 - Registration opens: March 1 - Program schedule released: March 11 - Registration closes: March 25 - Colloquium: April 1 For more information If you have questions or need more information, you can send email to the 2016 MASC-SLL organizers via organizers at mascsll.org Organizing Committee - Ellie Pavlick (Penn) - Hainan Xu (JHU) - Jo?o Sedoc (Penn) - Mohit Iyyer (UMD) - Vimal Manohar (JHU) - Wei Xu (Penn) Program Committee - Abhay Kashyap (UMBC) - Andrew Yates (Georgetown) - Ashraf Bah Rabiou (UDel) - Brian McMahan (Rutgers) - Bryan Perozzi (Stonybrook) - Denys Katerenchuk (CUNY) - Dipendra Misra (Cornell Tech) - Ellie Pavlick (Penn) - Hainan Xu (JHU) - He He (UMD) - Huy Viet Nguyen (UPitt) - Jeniya Tabassum (OSU) - Jo?o Sedoc (Penn) - Juneki Hong (CMU) - Noura Farra (Columbia) - Snigdha Chaturvedi (UMD) - Thien Huu Nguyen (NYU) - Vimal Manohar (JHU) Faculty Advisers - Chris Callison-Burch (Penn) - Hal Daume III (UMD) - Mark Dredze (JHU) -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From terry at salk.edu Thu Jan 21 13:36:50 2016 From: terry at salk.edu (Terry Sejnowski) Date: Thu, 21 Jan 2016 10:36:50 -0800 Subject: Connectionists: NEURAL COMPUTATION - February 1, 2016 In-Reply-To: Message-ID: Neural Computation - Volume 28, Number 2 - February 1, 2016 Available online for download now: http://www.mitpressjournals.org/toc/neco/28/2 ----- Article Correlational Neural Networks Sarath Chandar, Mitesh M Khapra, Hugo Larochelle, and Balaraman Ravindran Letters Timing of Cortical Events Preceding Voluntary Movement Victor L. Vvedensky, Andrey O. Prokofyev Mutual Information, Fisher Information, and Efficient Coding Xue-Xin Wei, Alan A Stocker Memory Stacking in Hierarchical Networks Johan Westok, Patrick J. C. May, and Hannu Tiitinen Infinite Continuous Feature Model for Psychiatric Comorbidity Analysis Isabel Valera, Francisco J. R. Ruiz, Pablo M. Olmos, Carlos Blanco, and Fernando Perez-Cruz Filtering With State-Observation Examples via Kernel Monte Carlo Filter Motonobu Kanagawa, Yu Nishiyama, Arthur Gretton, and Kenji Fukumizu ------------ ON-LINE -- http://www.mitpressjournals.org/neuralcomp SUBSCRIPTIONS - 2016 - VOLUME 28 - 12 ISSUES Student/Retired $78 Individual $138 Institution $1,108 MIT Press Journals, One Rogers Street, Cambridge, MA 02142-1209 Tel: (617) 253-2889 FAX: (617) 577-1545 journals-cs at mit.edu ------------ From shadmehr at jhu.edu Tue Jan 19 16:40:20 2016 From: shadmehr at jhu.edu (Reza Shadmehr) Date: Tue, 19 Jan 2016 16:40:20 -0500 Subject: Connectionists: Postdoctoral Fellowships at Hopkins BME Message-ID: *The Organization*: NeuroData (http://neurodata.io) is a team of data scientists at Johns Hopkins University's Biomedical Engineering Department building and applying state-of-the-art machine learning tools to solve pressing contemporary problems in neuroscience datasets. *The Role*: You will be a Postdoctoral Fellow, responsible for developing and applying scalable and robust machine learning tools to answer questions of interest, and writing papers on the results. All analyses will be open source, and often on open access data. Data will include teravoxel images, teravertex graphs, and terafeature tables. *The Requirements*: Strong data scientific skills, including foundational knowledge of statistics, machine learning, and numerical programming. In particular, essentially all code we write will be in R or Python. A PhD degree in a relevant field (e.g., computer science, math, physics, statistics, or neuroscience) is required. *The Logistics*: Postdoctoral Fellowship at JHU BME, salary commensurate with background training, benefits include health care and other stuff, including access to the best hospital in the world. Your office will be located in the Center for Imaging Science (http://cis.jhu.edu) in Clark Hall, at the Homewood Campus of Johns Hopkins University. *To Apply*: Send the following info to Prof. Josh Vogelstein at jovo at jhu.edu : - CV/Resume - An example project with code (ideally a link to an open source repo) - Graduate school transcript - Names/email of 2 people that can provide excellent recommendations in a timely fashion -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From pfeiffer at ini.phys.ethz.ch Mon Jan 25 05:41:50 2016 From: pfeiffer at ini.phys.ethz.ch (Michael Pfeiffer) Date: Mon, 25 Jan 2016 11:41:50 +0100 Subject: Connectionists: MSc program in Neural Systems and Computation - University of Zurich and ETH Zurich Message-ID: <56A5FBEE.2000005@ini.phys.ethz.ch> We are inviting applications for the MSc program in Neural Systems and Computation, an interdisciplinary program offered as a Joint Master Program by the University of Zurich and ETH Zurich, Switzerland. The program offers a theoretical and laboratory training in neural computation and systems neuroscience. It offers hands-on knowledge of data gathering, analysis and scientific presentation. Students join an international and interdisciplinary research community with expertise in neuroinformatics, advanced experimental techniques and neuromorphic engineering. Further information can be found on our homepage http://www.nsc.uzh.ch. We offer a specialized full-time Masters program open to students with a Bachelor?s degree in the following disciplines: neurosciences, information technology, electrical engineering, biology, physics, computer sciences, chemistry, mathematics, and mechanical/chemical/control engineering. The core courses (all offered in English) provide a common foundation for students with different educational backgrounds, and cover the following: 1. Systems Neurosciences 2. Neural Computation and Theoretical Neuroscience 3. Neurotechnologies and Neuromorphic Engineering The application deadline for students starting in Fall Semester 2016 is *February 15th 2016*. Details about the application process and required documents can be found here: http://www.nsc.uzh.ch/?page_id=10 Mentors of the program are Richard Hahnloser, Kevan Martin, Klaas Enno Stephan, Giacomo Indiveri, Jean-Pascal Pfister, Mehmet Fatih Yanik, Bruno Weber, Fritjof Helmchen, Valerio Mante, Ruedi Stoop, Tobi Delbruck, Daniel Kiper, Shih-Chii Liu, Michael Pfeiffer, Matthew Cook, Arko Ghosh, and Wolfger von der Behrens. The program is affiliated with the Mathematics and Natural Sciences Faculty (MNF) at the University of Zurich (UZH) and the Information Technology and Electrical Engineering Department (D-ITET) of the ETH Zurich. All applications are handled by the University of Zurich. Application documents should be sent by email to nsc at ini.uzh.ch. Best regards, Michael Pfeiffer -- ========================================= Dr. Michael Pfeiffer Postdoc, Program coordinator NSC Institute of Neuroinformatics University of Zurich and ETH Zurich Winterthurerstrasse 190 CH-8057 Zurich, Switzerland Tel. +41 44 635 30 45 Fax +41 44 635 30 53 pfeiffer (at) ini.phys.ethz.ch http://www.ini.uzh.ch/~pfeiffer/ ========================================= -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From mvanross at inf.ed.ac.uk Tue Jan 19 11:32:39 2016 From: mvanross at inf.ed.ac.uk (Mark van Rossum) Date: Tue, 19 Jan 2016 16:32:39 +0000 Subject: Connectionists: Meeting on Hebbian and homeostatic plasticity Message-ID: <569E6527.80904@inf.ed.ac.uk> Discussion meeting at the Royal Society, London, April 19 & 20, 2016 Integrating Hebbian and homeostatic plasticity You are kindly invited to this meeting organized by Kevin Fox and Michael Stryker which will bring together computational and experimental neuroscientists to discuss how interactions between Hebbian plasticity and homeostatic plasticity occur and how they can be detected and interrogated at the systems level. Talks by: John Lisman, Taro Toyozumi, Brent Doiron, Mark van Rossum, Wulfram Gerstner, Gina Turrigano, Philip Haydon, Lu Chen, Hey-Kyoung Lee, Michael Stryker, Kevin Fox, Daniel Feldman, Tara Keck, Frank Sengpiel and Mark H?bener. Register at https://royalsociety.org/events/2016/04/integrating-plasticity/ Poster deadline March 11th. -- The University of Edinburgh is a charitable body, registered in Scotland, with registration number SC005336. From morrison at fz-juelich.de Wed Jan 20 09:57:48 2016 From: morrison at fz-juelich.de (Abigail Morrison) Date: Wed, 20 Jan 2016 15:57:48 +0100 Subject: Connectionists: Senior software developer position available at the SimLab Neuroscience, Juelich Research Centre Message-ID: <569FA06C.2020509@fz-juelich.de> Dear colleagues, we are looking to recruit a senior scientific software developer at the Simulation Lab Neuroscience at the Juelich Research Centre, Germany. Our focus is on exploiting high performance computing to solve fundamental problems in neuroscience. If you have an interest in leading and participating in projects to develop innovative neuroinformatics applications on Europe's finest supercomputers, we would like to hear from you. For a full description and details of how to apply, please see the announcement on our website: http://www.fz-juelich.de/SharedDocs/Stellenangebote/_common/dna/2016-001-EN-JSC.html All the best, Abigail Morrison -- Prof. Dr. Abigail Morrison IAS-6 / INM-6 / SimLab Neuroscience J?lich Research Center & Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience Ruhr-University Bochum http://www.fz-juelich.de/inm/inm-6 http://www.fz-juelich.de/ias/jsc/slns http://www.ikn.psy.ruhr-uni-bochum.de Office: +49 2461 61-9805 Fax # : +49 2461 61-9460 ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Forschungszentrum Juelich GmbH 52425 Juelich Sitz der Gesellschaft: Juelich Eingetragen im Handelsregister des Amtsgerichts Dueren Nr. HR B 3498 Vorsitzender des Aufsichtsrats: MinDir Dr. Karl Eugen Huthmacher Geschaeftsfuehrung: Prof. Dr.-Ing. Wolfgang Marquardt (Vorsitzender), Karsten Beneke (stellv. Vorsitzender), Prof. Dr.-Ing. Harald Bolt, Prof. Dr. Sebastian M. Schmidt ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ From martaruizcostajussa at gmail.com Mon Jan 25 06:28:19 2016 From: martaruizcostajussa at gmail.com (Marta Ruiz) Date: Mon, 25 Jan 2016 12:28:19 +0100 Subject: Connectionists: 2nd CFP: Computer Speech and Language Special Issue on Deep Learning for Machine Translation Message-ID: *Computer Speech andLanguage Special Issue on Deep Learning for Machine Translation * Deep Learning has been successfully applied to many areas including Natural Language Processing, Speech Recognition and Image Processing. Deep learning techniques have surprised the entire community both academy and industry by powerfully learning from data. Recently, deep learning has been introduced to Machine Translation (MT). It first started as a kind of feature which was integrated in standard phrase or syntax-based statistical approaches. Deep learning has been shown useful in translation and language modeling as well as in reordering, tuning and rescoring. Additionally, deep learning has been applied to MT evaluation and quality estimation. But the biggest impact on MT appeared with the new paradigm proposal: Neural MT, which has just recently (in the Workshop of Machine Translation 2015) outperformed state-of-the-art systems. This new approach uses an autoencoder architecture to build a neural system that is capable of translating. With the new approach, the new big MT challenges lie on how to deal with large vocabularies, document translation and computational power among others*.* This hot topic is raising interest from the scientific community and as a response there have been several related events (i.e. tutorial[1] <#1928584617_684013530__ftn1> and winter school[2] <#1928584617_684013530__ftn2>). Moreover, the number of publications on this topic in top conferences such as ACL, NAACL, EMNLP has dramatically increased in the last three years. This would be the first special issue related to the topic. With this special issue, we pretend to offer a compilation of works that give the reader a global vision of how the deep learning techniques are applied to MT and what new challenges offers. This Special Issue expects high quality submissions on the following topics (but not limited): ? Including deep learning knowledge in standard MT approaches (statistical, rule-based, example-based...) ? Neural MT approaches ? MT hybrid techniques using deep learning ? Deep learning challenges in MT: vocabulary limitation, document translation, computational power ? MT evaluation with deep learning techniques ? MT quality estimation with deep learning techniques ? Using deep learning in spoken language translation *IMPORTANT DATES* Submission deadline: 30th March 2016 Notification of rejection/re-submission: 30th July 2016 Notification of final acceptance: 30th October 2016 Expected publication date: 30th January 2017 *GUEST EDITORS* Marta R. Costa-juss?, Universitat Polit?cnica de Catalunya, Spain. marta.ruiz at upc.edu Alexandre Allauzen, Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, France. allauzen at limsi.fr Lo?c Barrault, Universit? du Maine, France. loic.barrault at lium.univ-lemans.fr Kyunghyun Cho, New York University, USA. kyunghyun.cho at nyu.edu Holger Schwenk, Facebook, USA. schwenk at fb.com ------------------------------ [1] <#1928584617_684013530__ftnref1> http://naacl.org/naacl-hlt-2015/tutorial-deep-learning.html [2] <#1928584617_684013530__ftnref2> http://dl4mt.computing.dcu.ie/ -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From friedhelm.schwenker at uni-ulm.de Sun Jan 24 14:06:21 2016 From: friedhelm.schwenker at uni-ulm.de (Dr. Schwenker) Date: Sun, 24 Jan 2016 20:06:21 +0100 Subject: Connectionists: ANNPR 2016: Call for Papers Message-ID: <56A520AD.6020809@uni-ulm.de> **** Please apologize cross-postings. Call for Papers IAPR TC3 International Workshop on Artificial Neural Networks in Pattern Recognition (ANNPR 2016) September 28-30, 2016 Ulm University, Ulm, Germany ANNPR 2016 invites papers that present original work in areas of neural networks, machine learning and pattern recognition, focusing on both theoretical and applied aspects. Topics of interest include, but not limited to: Methodological Issues - Supervised learning - Unsupervised learning - Combination of supervised and unsupervised learning - Feed-forward, recurrent, and competitive neural nets - Kernel machines - Hierarchical modular architectures and hybrid systems - Combination of neural networks and Hidden Markov models - Multiple classifier systems and ensemble methods - Probabilistic graphical models - Kernel methods - Deep architectures Applications in Pattern Recognition - Image processing and segmentation - Handwritten recognition and Document analysis - Sensor-fusion and multi-modal processing - Feature extraction, dimension reduction - Clustering and vector quantization - Speech and speaker recognition - Data, text, and web mining - Bioinformatics/Cheminformatics Important Dates Paper submission: May 4, 2016 Notification of acceptance: June 22, 2016 Camera ready due: July 6, 2016 Workshop: September 28-30, 2016 General Chairs Friedhelm Schwenker, Ulm University, Germany Hazem Abbas, German University of Cairo, Egypt Neamat El Gayar, Cairo University, Egypt Edmondo Trentin, University of Siena, Italy For more information, please visit us: http://neuro.informatik.uni-ulm.de/ANNPR2016/ -- Dr. Friedhelm Schwenker University of Ulm Institute of Neural Information Processing D-89069 Ulm, Germany phone: +49-731-50-24159 fax: +49-731-50-24156 email: friedhelm.schwenker at uni-ulm.de www: http://www.uni-ulm.de/in/neuroinformatik/mitarbeiter/f-schwenker.html From jeanette at csc.kth.se Sat Jan 23 09:12:17 2016 From: jeanette at csc.kth.se (=?Windows-1252?Q?Jeanette_H=E4llgren_Kotaleski?=) Date: Sat, 23 Jan 2016 14:12:17 +0000 Subject: Connectionists: =?windows-1252?q?Postdocs_integrated_into_the_Hum?= =?windows-1252?q?an_brain_Project_=96_specifically_data-driven_modeling_a?= =?windows-1252?q?t_the_subcellular_or_network_levels=2C_or_tool_developme?= =?windows-1252?q?nt/support?= Message-ID: <1453558343742.51612@csc.kth.se> Dear Colleagues, dear all, KTH Royal Institute of Technology, Stockholm, is currently recruiting postdocs to be working within the Human Brain Project. 1) Postdoc/application expert ? specifically development of brain modeling tools: Specifically for the current position software applications providing user-friendly interface to cellular-level modelling tools will be developed, supported and used. These will include an optimization framework (for fitting electrical models of neurons to their observed electrical behaviour) and also a morphology pipeline (the tool used to analyse and validate neuron morphologies). More info and how to apply at: https://intra.kth.se/en/anstallning/karriar/karriar-och-kompetensutveckling-kompetensstod/lediga-jobb-externa/what:job/jobID:86327/where:4/ 2) Postdoc in computational systems (neuro)biology ? specifically synaptic plasticity and neuromodulation: Specifically for the above position data-driven modeling of receptor induced cascades such as GPCR dependent cascades involved in neuromodulation and synaptic signaling will be done. More info and how to apply at: https://intra.kth.se/en/anstallning/karriar/karriar-och-kompetensutveckling-kompetensstod/lediga-jobb-externa/what:job/jobID:86205/where:4/ 3) Postdoc in brain simulations - specifically motor control and selection of behaviour: Specifically for the position, modeling of motor control and learning with basal ganglia as important components will be done. The modeling tools are mainly Nest and Neuron. More info and how to apply at: https://intra.kth.se/en/anstallning/karriar/karriar-och-kompetensutveckling-kompetensstod/lediga-jobb-externa/what:job/jobID:86268/where:4/ All the best, Jeanette Hellgren Kotaleski Prof, School of Computer Science and Communication, KTH Royal Institute of Technology, Stockholm -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From jdrugo at gmail.com Mon Jan 25 09:32:59 2016 From: jdrugo at gmail.com (Jan Drugowitsch) Date: Mon, 25 Jan 2016 15:32:59 +0100 Subject: Connectionists: Postdoctoral position in computational neuroscience at Harvard Message-ID: *Postdoctoral position in the Drugowitsch Lab in computational neuroscience* *Location*: Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA *Start*: May 2016 or after We are looking for a highly creative and motivated postdoctoral fellow to work in the field of computational and systems neuroscience in the group of Jan Drugowitsch - Department of Neurobiology at Harvard Medical School ( http://neuro.hms.harvard.edu/people/faculty/jan-drugowitsch). The group works on questions of decision-making and navigation under uncertainty, ranging from the level of neural populations to that of behavior. The candidate is expected to perform research related to these topics. Close interaction and collaboration with other members of the department is anticipated. Candidates should have a strong analytical background (e.g., computational neuroscience, physics, mathematics, engineering, etc.) and feature an interest in the role of computation in neural populations and in theoretical neuroscience in general. Experience or familiarity with related machine-learning fields is also desirable. Previous experience should include sufficient programming skills to run numerical simulations, Bayesian methods, and expertise in the analysis of dynamical systems. The position starts in or after May 2016, and is funded for several years, with an initial one-year appointment and expectation of extension given satisfactory performance. Salary depends on experience and is at levels above the NIH scale. Candidates should send a single pdf file, consisting of a 1-page motivation letter, CV, and publication list to jan_drugowitsch at hms.harvard.edu. Furthermore, candidates should organize two letters of reference, to be sent to the same e-mail address. The position is open until filled. Jan Drugowitsch will be available at the Cosyne conference and workshops for question about the position. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From bgholami at aretexeng.com Wed Jan 20 10:12:00 2016 From: bgholami at aretexeng.com (Behnood Gholami) Date: Wed, 20 Jan 2016 10:12:00 -0500 Subject: Connectionists: Job Posting: Research Engineer/Scientist, Brain-Computer Interface, Machine Learning, Computational Neuroscience Message-ID: *AreteX Systems, Inc. ? New York, NY* AreteX Systems, a medical technology startup company accelerating the use of information technology in healthcare, has an immediate opening for a Research Engineer/Scientist in its office located in New York City. The position involves developing signal processing algorithms for innovative biomedical technologies involving physiological signals. We are looking for a self-motivated, highly talented individual with an excellent background in signal processing, machine learning, and brain-computer interface. The successful candidate will work closely with a team of physicians, nurses, engineers, and scientists in designing new clinical decision support systems. Candidates with experience in the analysis of experimental data derived from---but not limited to---auditory/visual/cross-sensory psychophysical, EEG, ECG, and galvanic-skin conductance, data would be given a higher priority. *Minimum Requirements:* - MS or PhD in electrical engineering, computer science, biomedical engineering, applied mathematics, neuroscience, or a similar discipline. - Knowledge of advanced concepts in signal processing. - Research experience in biosignal analysis or brain-computer interface applications. - Knowledge of methods, theory, and application of machine learning techniques. - Proficient at writing technical papers/reports/presentations. - Experience with Python. *Preferred Qualifications:* - Prior expertise and exposure using non-invasive human physiological measures such as EEG, ECG, galvanic-skin conductance (electrodermal activity), or other categorically similar methodologies. - Prior experience with mechanical ventilation and fluid management technologies in the intensive care units. - Knowledge of control systems design and dynamical systems modeling. - Prior experience in feature extraction from physiological signals. - Experience working with quantitative methods of neural data analysis. Send your cover letter and CV to info at aretexeng.com. -- Behnood Gholami, Ph.D. Chief Executive Officer AreteX Systems, Inc. Phone: (347) 774-1617 www.aretexeng.com -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From gevang at mit.edu Mon Jan 25 10:18:12 2016 From: gevang at mit.edu (Georgios Evangelopoulos) Date: Mon, 25 Jan 2016 10:18:12 -0500 Subject: Connectionists: Brains, Minds and Machines Summer Course 2016 Message-ID: Brains, Minds and Machines Summer Course 2016 ======================================= A Special Topics Course at MBL Woods Hole, MA Directors: Gabriel Kreiman, Children?s Hospital, Harvard Medical School; and Tomaso Poggio, Massachusetts Institute of Technology * Course Dates: Aug. 15 - Sep. 5, 2016 * More information: http://cbmm.mit.edu/summer-school/2016 * Application Deadline: Mar. 14, 2016 * Apply: http://www.mbl.edu/education/special-topics-courses/brains-minds-and-machines/ The problem of intelligence ? how the brain produces intelligent behavior and how we may be able to replicate intelligence in machines ? is arguably the greatest problem in science and technology. To solve it we will need to understand how human intelligence emerges from computation in neural circuits, with rigor sufficient to reproduce similar intelligent behavior in machines. Moreover, a synergistic combination of cognitive science, neurobiology, engineering, mathematics, and computer science holds the promise to build more robust and sophisticated algorithms implemented in intelligent machines. Set in the charming town of Woods Hole, MA, the Brains, Minds and Machines 2016 Summer Course, organized by the Center for Brains, Minds and Machines (CBMM) will feature lectures and tutorials by leaders in the field, covering among others Neuroscience: neurons and models, Computational vision, Biological vision, Machine learning, Bayesian inference, Planning and motor control, Memory, Social cognition, Inverse problems & well-posedness, Audition and speech processing, Natural language processing. In addition, students will be working on cutting-edge projects with the help of faculty and teaching assistants. CBMM will also be hosting an Evening Lecture Series, including speakers from both industry and academia, in the fields of neuroscience, computer science, and cognitive science. The course aims to cross-educate, and is appropriate for, graduate students, postdocs, and faculty in computer science, cognitive science and neuroscience. All local costs of participating in this course (tuition, MBL room & board) are provided by an NSF Science and Technology Center award to the Center for Brains, Minds, and Machines, Grant No. CCF-1231216. Limited travel reimbursement may be available for admitted students. -- Georgios Evangelopoulos Postdoctoral Fellow, MIT, IIT http://www.mit.edu/~gevang -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From djaeger at emory.edu Wed Jan 20 14:36:03 2016 From: djaeger at emory.edu (Jaeger, Dieter) Date: Wed, 20 Jan 2016 19:36:03 +0000 Subject: Connectionists: Open postdoctoral position to study cortico-thalamic interactions in the motor system & basal ganglia Message-ID: Opportunity for a postdoctoral fellow to join an NIH funded Obama BRAIN initiative project on the role of the basal ganglia in motor decision making in behaving mice (https://projectreporter.nih.gov/project_info_description.cfm?icde=0&aid=9012601). The project aims to elucidate how subcortical structures feed back onto and influence cortical processing. The position will involve multisite recording and optogenetics in behaving mice in the Jaeger lab at Emory University in Atlanta, which provides a strong training environment in computational and systems neuroscience in collaboration with the Georgia Institute of Technology. The successful candidate needs previous electrophysiological experience and strong data analysis skills using Matlab or Python. A PhD in Biomedical Engineering or Neuroscience is preferred. If interested & qualified, please contact djaeger at emory.edu Dieter Jaeger, PhD Professor Department of Biology, Emory University 1510 Clifton Rd., Atlanta, GA 30322 404 727 8139, e-mail: djaeger at emory.edu http://www.biology.emory.edu/research/Jaeger ________________________________ This e-mail message (including any attachments) is for the sole use of the intended recipient(s) and may contain confidential and privileged information. If the reader of this message is not the intended recipient, you are hereby notified that any dissemination, distribution or copying of this message (including any attachments) is strictly prohibited. If you have received this message in error, please contact the sender by reply e-mail message and destroy all copies of the original message (including attachments). -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From gustau.camps at uv.es Sun Jan 24 14:50:48 2016 From: gustau.camps at uv.es (Gustau Camps-Valls) Date: Sun, 24 Jan 2016 20:50:48 +0100 Subject: Connectionists: 2 PhD positions in Machine Learning for Geosciences [ERC Consolidator Grant project] Message-ID: <56A52B18.6030602@uv.es> Dear Colleagues, I'd appreciate if you could circulate these two PhD positions in my group attached to an ERC Consolidator Grant project. Two different profiles: computer science and geosciences. Thanks so much! Best regards, Gustau ----------------------------------------------------------------- ERC project: 2 PhD positions in Machine Learning for Geosciences ----------------------------------------------------------------- We are searching for outstanding candidates with a strong interest in machine learning for geosciences to cover 2 PhD positions to join the Image and Signal Processing (ISP) group in the Universitat de Valencia, Spain, http://isp.uv.es. The positions are funded by an ERC Consolidator Grant 2015-2020 entitled "Statistical Learning for Earth Observation Data Analysis" (SEDAL) under the direction of Prof. Gustau Camps-Valls. More info about the openings in http://isp.uv.es/sedal.pdf and http://sedalproject.wordpress.com *** The project and job description We aim to develop the next generation of statistical inference methods to analyze Earth Observation (EO) data. Machine learning models have helped to monitor land, oceans, and atmosphere through the analysis and estimation of climate and biophysical parameters. Current approaches, however, cannot deal efficiently with the particular characteristics of remote sensing data. We will develop advanced regression (retrieval, model inversion) methods to improve efficiency, prediction accuracy and uncertainties, encode physical knowledge about the problem, attain self-explanatory models, learn graphical causal models to explain the complex interactions between essential climate variables and observations, and discover hidden essential drivers and confounding factors in Climate/Geo Sciences. Highly motivated students in computer science, statistics, machine learning, electrical engineering, physics, or mathematics are encouraged to apply. All candidates should have a solid understanding and knowledge of machine learning and statistics, and being particularly interested in climate science, remote sensing, and geoscience problems. Positions will cover two different profiles: (1) Remote sensing and geosciences: model inversion, radiative transfer models, biogeochemistry, climate science, detection and attribution, global carbon/heat/water fluxes, in-situ datasets for land/vegetation/atmosphere monitoring; and (2) Machine learning, statistics and signal processing: regression and time series analysis, change and anomaly detection, structured/relational/transfer learning, graphical models and causal inference. In both cases, good programming skills (Matlab/Python/R/C++), a critical and organized sense for data analysis, as well as maturity and commitment, strong communication, presentation and writing skills are a big plus. *** Application details - How? Send me: 2-pages CV, motivation letter, 3 best papers, 3 recommendation letters or contacts - When? Preferred starting dates: May 2016 - How long? 1 year contract (extendable upon mutual satisfaction and qualifications to 3-4 years) - How much? Salary according to UV scales including social security, health insurance benefits, and travel money - Where? Valencia, Spain, Mediterranean, nice weather, hike and beach. Excellent cost-of-living index = 55 *** Contact * Important notice before applying: read the project info above carefully, read (some of) the related papers, and think about the motivation and goals of the project. And now, sit back, breath and think: could you contribute into something? Do you really understand what we want to do in SEDAL? Do you have ideas to share with me? Do you have the right background and expertise? Are you brilliant to undertake the challenge? * Ready to apply? Send your dossier in one single PDF to gustau.camps at uv.es, subject: SEDAL application ------------------------------------------- Prof. Gustau Camps-Valls Image and Signal Processing Group (ISP) Image Processing Laboratory (IPL) Office: 3.2.4 Parc Cient?fic - Campus de Paterna Universitat de Val?ncia C/ Catedr?tico Jos? Beltr?n, 2 46980 Paterna, Val?ncia. Spain. Tlf: +34 963 544 064 Fax: +34 963 543 261 http://isp.uv.es http://www.uv.es/gcamps ------------------------------------------- From Hugo.Larochelle at USherbrooke.ca Thu Jan 21 12:26:22 2016 From: Hugo.Larochelle at USherbrooke.ca (Hugo Larochelle) Date: Thu, 21 Jan 2016 17:26:22 +0000 Subject: Connectionists: ICLR 2016 Workshop Track - Call for Extended Abstracts Message-ID: <8465AC6F-9350-4502-9CB6-A60411597339@usherbrooke.ca> ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 4th International Conference on Learning Representations - Workshop Track (ICLR 2016) ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Website: http://www.iclr.cc/ Workshop Track - Extended abstract deadline: February 18th, 2016 Location: Caribe Hilton, San Juan, Puerto Rico, May 2-4, 2016 Overview -------- It is well understood that the performance of machine learning methods is heavily dependent on the choice of data representation (or features) on which they are applied. Despite the importance of representation learning to machine learning and to application areas such as vision, speech, audio and NLP, there was no venue for researchers who share a common interest in this topic. The goal of ICLR has been to help fill this void. A non-exhaustive list of relevant topics: - unsupervised, semi-supervised, and supervised representation learning - metric learning and kernel learning - dimensionality expansion - sparse modeling - hierarchical models - optimization for representation learning - learning representations of outputs or states - implementation issues, parallelization, software platforms, hardware - applications in vision, audio, speech, natural language processing, robotics, neuroscience, or any other field ICLR features two tracks: a Conference Track and a Workshop Track. However, this year, conference and workshop submissions are reviewed separately, in two different periods. With the Conference Track already under way, this call for extended abstract is in relation to the Workshop Track. Extended abstracts submitted to the Workshop Track should be 2-3 pages long (excluding references) and describe late-breaking developments. This track is meant to carry on the tradition of the former Snowbird Learning Workshop. These contributions are considered as workshop papers (and can be published elsewhere). They will be lightly reviewed by ICLR reviewers. Note that some of the conference submissions that are not accepted to the Conference Track will also be invited to be presented under the Workshop Track. ICLR Submission Instructions - Workshop Track --------------------------------------------- By February 18th, 2016, 2:00 PM Pacific Standard time, authors must submit the PDF of their extended abstract to openreview. For more information on preparing your extended abstract, including style files and the URL for the openreview ICLR 2016 Workshop Track website, please see http://www.iclr.cc/doku.php?id=iclr2016:main Acceptance decisions of extended abstract will be sent by March 28th. At least one author of each accepted extended abstract will be required to register to the ICLR event and present their work in poster format. Organizers ---------- Yoshua Bengio, Universit? de Montreal, General Chair Yann LeCun, New York University and Facebook, General Chair Hugo Larochelle, Twitter and Universit? de Sherbrooke, Senior Program Chair Brian Kingsbury, IBM Watson Group, Program Chair Samy Bengio, Google, Program Chair Contact ------- The organizers can be contacted at iclr2016.programchairs at gmail.com From brody at princeton.edu Fri Jan 22 15:15:47 2016 From: brody at princeton.edu (Carlos Brody) Date: Fri, 22 Jan 2016 15:15:47 -0500 Subject: Connectionists: Intensive summer course at Princeton Message-ID: <5D7D0C35-C725-4F5B-98AE-D1169AED91DE@princeton.edu> Announcing a 4-week Intensive Summer Course at Princeton Neurotechnologies for Analysis of Neural Dynamics Directors: David W. Tank and Michael Berry, Princeton University, Dates: June 12 ? July 9, 2016. Application Form and Course Schedule: NAND.princeton.edu Application Deadline: Rolling admissions starting February 1, 2016. This course is designed to emphasize the major ways that scientists trained in the physical and information sciences contribute to the advance of neuroscience. It will introduce students with quantitative training in the physical sciences, mathematics or engineering to the concepts and research methodologies of modern neuroscience. Topics covered will range from cellular biophysics to systems neuroscience, including particularly imaging methods for the study of single neurons, networks of neurons and human brain dynamics during execution of behavioral computations. The course will be unique in its focus on neural dynamics at several scales of complexity ? cells, circuits, intact brains ? and the combination of didactic lectures and laboratory exercises, including cellular biophysics, synaptic interactions and plasticity in neuronal networks, and fMRI imaging of targeted brain regions in human subjects. The course includes substantive instruction in neurotechnologies, ranging from large-scale multi- electrode and optical recording, optogenetic stimulation and mathematical analysis of neural dynamics within the datasets produced by these methods. The capstone of this course will be one-week student-designed research projects integrating concepts and methodologies encountered during the initial formal lectures and laboratory exercises. Women and under-represented minorities are encouraged to apply. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From demian.battaglia at univ-amu.fr Mon Jan 25 15:50:21 2016 From: demian.battaglia at univ-amu.fr (Demian Battaglia) Date: Mon, 25 Jan 2016 21:50:21 +0100 Subject: Connectionists: Brain Connectivity Workshop 2016, Marseille (France) Message-ID: <07BEE7EB-D03C-43E3-B31F-D66FD90BFA95@univ-amu.fr> *** Please apologize cross-postings *** Brain Connectivity Workshop 2016, Marseille (France) ------------------------------------------------------------------------ When: 22nd to 24th June, 2016 Link to official website: http://bcw2016.org We are happy to announce the 15th edition of the Brain Connectivity Workshop (BCW) to take place in Marseille from the 22nd to the 24th of June 2016. The Brain Connectivity Workshop (BCW) is a well-established workshop series, which has been held annually in Europe, USA, Australia and Asia for the last 14 years. BCW is an official satellite of the annual meeting of OHBM, which is held in Geneva, Switzerland in 2016. BCW attracts every year a public of 100-200 participants working in cognitive, computational and clinical neurosciences. The discussions are centered on all themes around brain connectivity including structural and functional imaging, modeling, brain function and clinics. BCW is highly influential in the field due to the traditionally high quality of speakers and a long track record of innovation. For instance, both, the Connectome and The Virtual Brain have been born within the BCW community. The typical BCW format ?a first educational day of lectures held by international authorities in their fields, followed by two days of shorter talks with ample time for discussion provides a unique forum for creativity, controversy and brainstorming. BCW 2016, introduced by a first day of tutorials by experts in their field, will feature focused sessions on themes such as perturbing the brain, mapping the brain, and brain dynamics in function (cognition) and dysfunction (epilepsy). Registration will open soon. NB!!!!!!! Please note that European Cup of Football will be held in France during this period and hotels are going to be booked fast! Confirmed educational lecturers (day 1) and workshop speakers (days 2-3) include: Fabrice Bartolomei (Aix-Marseille University, Marseille, France) Michael Breakspear (QIMR, Brisbane, Australia) Vince Calhoun (University Of New Mexico, Albuquerque, NM) Karl Friston (UCL, London, UK) Jorge Gonzalez-Martinez (Cleveland Clinic, Cleveland, OH) Marc Goodfellow (University of Exeter, Exeter, UK) Charles Gray (Montana State University, Bozeman, MT) Claudius Gros (Goethe University, Frankfurt am Main, Germany) Sean Hill (EPFL, Lausanne, Switzerland) Martin Hoffman-Apitius (Fraunhofer Institute SCAI, St Augustin, Germany) Esther Krook-Magnuson (University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, MN) Pierre Luppi (Lyon Neuroscience Research Center, Lyon, France) Randy McIntosh (Baycrest Research Center, Toronto, ON) Lionel Naccache (ICM, Paris, France) Ivan Soltesz (UC Irvine, CA) Olaf Sporns (Indiana University, Bloomington, IN) William Stacey (University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI) Gregor Thut (University of Glasgow, Glasgow, UK) Stephan Van Gils (University of Twente, Ae Enschede, The Netherlands) Michael Wibral (Goethe University, Frankfurt am Main, Germany) A special evening lecture will be delivered by Patrick Chauvel (Aix-Marseille University, Marseille, France). A detailed program is coming soon. Organizing committee: Viktor Jirsa, Chair (INS, Aix-Marseille University, UMR 1106 INSERM) Demian Battaglia, Christian B?nar, Mireille Bonnard, Monique Esclapez (INS, Aix-Marseille University) Andrea Brovelli (INT, Aix-Marseille University), Maxime Guye (CRMBM, Aix-Marseille University, UMR 7339 CNRS & APHM) Ingo Bojak (University of Reading, UK). An event sponsored by: University Aix-Marseille, Brain Products, Bionics, Springer EPJ Nonlinear Biomedical Physics Journal, Codebox, Institute of System Neuroscience Inserm, Institute of Neuroscience Timone, Center for Magnetic Resonance in Biology and Medicine, Mediterranean Society of Neuroscience (IBRO member) From jan.schnupp at dpag.ox.ac.uk Tue Jan 26 11:58:42 2016 From: jan.schnupp at dpag.ox.ac.uk (Jan Schnupp) Date: Tue, 26 Jan 2016 16:58:42 +0000 Subject: Connectionists: Postoctoral Position and two PhD positions in Auditory Systems Neuroscience in Hong Kong Message-ID: One postdoctoral position and two PhD graduate studentships in auditory neuroscience are available from June 2016 in a new research group set up by Prof. Jan Schnupp at the City University of Hong Kong. Our lab will use electrophysiological and psychoacoustic techniques to study neural mechanisms of auditory perception in humans and rats. Experiments studying plastic changes in the central auditory pathway following cochlear implant stimulation are also planned. Hong Kong is an exceptionally vibrant and exciting place to live and work. Key techniques in our research include the digital processing of electrophysiological and acoustic signals, as well as automating the behavioral psychoacoustic testing of experimental animals. We are therefore particularly interested in candidates with a background, or at least an interest, in computer programming, computational and or statistical modelling, and perhaps a little electronics. Experience in animal handling, small animal surgery and electrophysiological recordings would also be desirable. If you are interested, please contact jan-hk at schnupp.net, including a CV. -- Prof Jan Schnupp University of Oxford Dept. of Physiology, Anatomy and Genetics Sherrington Building - Parks Road Oxford OX1 3PT - UK +44-1865-282012 http://jan.schnupp.net -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From m.a.wiering at rug.nl Wed Jan 27 10:06:10 2016 From: m.a.wiering at rug.nl (Wiering, M.A.) Date: Wed, 27 Jan 2016 16:06:10 +0100 Subject: Connectionists: Deadline extension for special issue in Neurocomputing: Multiobjective Reinforcement Learning: Theory and Applications Message-ID: *Special Issue in the journal Neurocomputing:* *Multiobjective Reinforcement Learning: Theory and Applications* *** One month extension for submitting papers *** There will be a month?s extension to the deadline for submitting papers for the upcoming special issue of the Neurocomputing journal on the topic ?Multiobjective Reinforcement Learning: Theory and Applications?. The full Call For Papers is included below. The submission website for the journal is located at: http://ees.elsevier.com/ To ensure that all manuscripts are correctly identified for inclusion into the special issue, it is important that authors select *SI:Multiobjective RL *when they reach the ?*Article Type? *step in the submission process. ------------------------------ *Multiobjective Reinforcement Learning: Theory and Applications* Many real-life problems involve dealing with multiple objectives. For example, in network routing the criteria consist of energy consumption, latency, and channel capacity, which are in essence conflicting objectives. When system designers want to optimize more than one objective, it is not always clear a priori which objectives are correlated and how they influence each other upon inspecting the problem at hand. As sometimes objectives are conflicting, there usually exists no single optimal solution. In those cases, it is desirable to obtain a set of trade-off solutions between the objectives. This problem has in the last decade also gained the attention of many researchers in the field of Reinforcement Learning (RL). RL addresses sequential decision problems in initially (possibly) unknown stochastic environments. The goal is the maximization of the agent's reward in a potentially unknown environment that is not always completely observable. Until now, there has been no special issue in a journal or a book on reinforcement learning that covered the topic of multiobjective reinforcement learning. *State of the art* We consider the extension of RL to multiobjective (stochastic) rewards (also called utilities in decision theory). Techniques from multi-objective optimization are often used for multi-objective RL in order to improve the exploration-exploitation tradeoff. Multi-objective optimization (MOO), which is a sub-area of multi-criteria decision making (MCDM), considers the optimization of more than one objective simultaneously and a decision maker decides either which solutions are important for the user or when to present these solutions to the user for further consideration. Currently, MOO algorithms are seldom used for stochastic optimization, which makes it an unexplored but very promising research area. The resulting algorithms are a hybrid between MCDM and stochastic optimization. The RL algorithms are enriched with the intuition and computational efficiency of MOO in handing multi-objective problems. *Aim and scope* The main goal of this special issue is to solicit research on multi-objective reinforcement learning. We encourage submissions - describing applications of MO methods in RL with a focus on optimization in difficult environments that are possibly dynamic, uncertain and partially observable. - offering theoretical insights in online or offline learning approaches for multi-objective problem domains. *Topics of interests* We enthusiastically solicit papers on relevant topics such as: - Reinforcement learning algorithms for solving multi-objective sequential decision making problems - Dynamic programming techniques and adaptive dynamic programming techniques handling multiple objectives - Theoretical results on the learnability of optimal policies, convergence of algorithms in qualitative settings, etc. - Decision making in dynamic and uncertain multi-objective environments - Applications and benchmark problems for multi-objective reinforcement learning. - Novel frameworks for multi-objective reinforcement learning - Real-world applications in engineering, business, computer science, biological sciences, scientific computation, etc. in dynamic and uncertain environments solved with multi-objective reinforcement learning *Important dates* - Submissions open: December 1st 2015 - Submissions close: March 5th 2016 - Notification of acceptance: May 15th 2016 - Final manuscript due: 1 August 2016 - Expected publication date (online): November 2016 -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From m.plumbley at surrey.ac.uk Wed Jan 27 11:32:46 2016 From: m.plumbley at surrey.ac.uk (m.plumbley at surrey.ac.uk) Date: Wed, 27 Jan 2016 16:32:46 +0000 Subject: Connectionists: SpaRTaN-MacSeNet Spring School on Sparse Representations and Compressed Sensing, 4-8 April 2016, Ilmenau, Germany Message-ID: SpaRTaN-MacSeNet Spring School on Sparse Representations and Compressed Sensing 4-8 April 2016, Ilmenau, Germany www.macsenet.eu/SpringSchool The SpaRTaN-MacSeNet Spring School on Sparse Representations and Compressed Sensing Spring School will be of interest to graduate students, researchers and industry professionals working in this fast moving and exciting area. The five day school is split into two components, during three days, a panel of experts will offer lectures and tutorials covering the theory of sparse representations, compressed sensing and related topics, and applications of these methods in areas such as image processing, audio signal processing, and signal processing on graphs. The remaining two days will be devoted to software carpentry, giving researchers the computing skills they need to get more done in less time and with less pain. Topics and speakers will include: - Gerald Schuller (Fraunhofer IDMT): Neural Networks and Sparse Coding from the Signal Processing Perspective - Francis Bach (INRIA): Large Scale Optimization; Probabilistic Modelling - Mike Davies (University of Edinburgh): Compressed Sensing Theory and Extensions - Mario Figueiredo (Instituto de Telecomunica??es): Convex Optimization in Inverse Problems and Machine Learning - Sergios Theodoridis (University of Athens): Learning in Reproducing Kernel Hilbert Spaces - Ian Marshall (University of Edinburgh): Compressed Sensing in MRI - Wenwu Wang (University of Surrey): Sparse Representation and Dictionary Learning for Source Separation, Localisation and Tracking - Sacha Krstlovic (Audio Analytic): Audio Event detection in an Industrial Environment - Karen Egiazarian (Noiseless Imaging): Image Denoising and Enhancement - Pierre Vandergheynst (EPFL) Graph Signal Processing - Jakob Abesser (Fraunhofer IDMT): Instrument Centered Parameter Sstimation and Sound Synthesis The programme will include a Keynote talk by Prof. Karlheinz Brandenburg (Fraunhofer IDMT). There will also be an opportunity for participants to present a poster, giving a chance to discuss their own work with their peers and the speakers. How to apply: To apply, please submit the following information to macsenet at surrey.ac.uk: * Full name * Email address * Phone Number * Address * Affiliation * Your CV * A cover letter of up to 2000 characters * A short letter of recommendation from one referee of your choice * (optional) Title of the poster you would present For successful applicants there will be a small registration fee of ?300 to cover the cost of their meals and accommodation. Important Dates 2016-01-18 Applications opens 2016-02-26 Deadline for Applications 2016-03-11 Notification of acceptance 2016-04-04 Spring School Starts Organizers The SpaRTaN-MacSeNet Spring School on Sparse Representations and Compressed Sensing is organized and sponsored by the SpaRTaN (Sparse Representations and Compressed Sensing Training Network, www.spartan-itn.eu) Marie Curie Initial Training Network (ITN) funded by the EU Seventh Framework Programme (FP7-PEOPLE-ITN-2013-607290), and the MacSeNet (Machine Sensing Training Network, www.macsenet.eu) Marie Sklodowska-Curie Action Innovative Training Network (ITN) funded by the EU H2020 Programme (H2020-MSCA-ITN-2014-642685). -- Prof Mark D Plumbley Professor of Signal Processing Centre for Vision, Speech and Signal Processing (CVSSP) University of Surrey Guildford, Surrey, GU2 7XH, UK Email: m.plumbley at surrey.ac.uk From paul.cisek at umontreal.ca Thu Jan 28 16:56:24 2016 From: paul.cisek at umontreal.ca (Paul Cisek) Date: Thu, 28 Jan 2016 16:56:24 -0500 Subject: Connectionists: Conference announcement: "The neuroscience of decision-making" Message-ID: <025901d15a16$bb5909d0$320b1d70$@umontreal.ca> 38th International Symposium of the GRSNC The neuroscience of decision-making May 2-3, 2016 Universit? de Montr?al WEBSITE: http://www.grsnc.umontreal.ca/38s/ PROGRAM: http://www.grsnc.umontreal.ca/38s/prog_e.html REGISTRATION: http://appl.grsnc.umontreal.ca/en/symposium/38s/registration.cfm POSTER: http://www.grsnc.umontreal.ca/38s/38s_poster.pdf We are pleased to announce the 38th symposium of the Groupe de Recherche sur le Syst?me Nerveux Central (GRSNC) which is entitled "The neurosciences of decision-making". This symposium will be held on May 2-3, 2016 at the Universit? de Montr?al, Pavillon 3200 Jean-Brillant, room B-2245 and the organizers are Drs Paul Cisek (UdeM), Alain Dagher (McGill), Lesley Fellows (McGill), John Kalaska (UdeM) et Peter Shizgal (Concordia). Research on the neural bases of decision-making has experienced a rapid growth in the last 20 years. It addresses a great diversity of questions, ranging from how animals weigh the costs and benefits of different actions to what goes wrong when humans exhibit maladaptive behavior, such as in addiction. In this symposium, we will discuss cutting-edge research on this topic, reviewing the progress that has been made and addressing the central open questions facing this rapidly developing field. In planning the sessions, we have paid particular attention to issues that stretch from the most basic neuroscience all the way to clinical applications. We will highlight converging evidence from the full range of neuroscientific methods applied in this field, considered within a diversity of conceptual frameworks. There will be four sessions of presentations by invited speakers from around the world as well as two contributed poster sessions. The presentations are regrouped in for sessions: * Brain representations of value: Common or multiple (Chairperson: Peter Shizgal) * Encoding and learning values: Neural and computational mechanisms (Chairperson: Alain Dagher) * Decision in the wild (Chairperson: John Kalaska) * Diseases and deviances (Chairperson: Lesley Fellows) Lecturers: Joshua D. Berke, Thomas Boraud, Paul Cisek, Alain Dagher, Peter Dayan, Nathaniel Daw, Lesley Fellows, J. Randall Flanagan, Michael J. Frank, Karl Friston, Hugh Garavan, Paul W. Glimcher, Joseph Kable, Elizabeth A. Murray, Michael L. Platt, David Redish, Michael N. Shadlen, Peter Shizgal, Daphna Shohamy and Jonathan D. Wallis. Submissions are invited for poster presentations. The deadline for submission is March 31, 2016 We would appreciate if you could forward this message to colleagues and students. Manon Dumas for the organizing committee Groupe de recherche sur le syst?me nerveux central (GRSNC) Universit? de Montr?al D?partement de neurosciences Pavillon Paul-G.-Desmarais, bureau 4115 Courriel: m.dumas at umontreal.ca T?l?phone: (514) 343-6366 T?l?copieur: (514) 343-6113 -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From pblouw at uwaterloo.ca Sun Jan 31 02:01:07 2016 From: pblouw at uwaterloo.ca (Peter Blouw) Date: Sun, 31 Jan 2016 02:01:07 -0500 Subject: Connectionists: Postdoc position in large-scale neural modeling -- Eliasmith lab Message-ID: In brief, the Eliasmith lab at the Centre for Theoretical Neuroscience has a position available for a 2-year postdoc. The focus is on large-scale spiking neural models that exhibit interesting behaviors and run on supercomputing infrastructure. "Interesting behaviour" is broadly defined, including vision, motor control, decision making, any variety of learning, audition, language processing, and so on. Full details below: *SOSCIP/IBM Canada Post-Doctoral Fellow (PDF) Research Scientist* Launched in 2012, SOSCIP was founded by seven Ontario universities and IBM Canada Limited as a collaborative research consortium, with a mandate to bring together academic researchers and small- and medium-sized companies to drive innovation using state-of-the-art advanced computing and big data analytics technologies, commercial outcomes for social and economic development in Ontario. New investments from IBM Canada and other stakeholders have enabled SOSCIP to expand its computing platforms and resources to increase capacity and add new members. With the addition of our three new academic partners, membership in the consortium has more than doubled over the last two years to 16 organizations. The IBM Canada Research & Development Centre is expanding, and we are seeking a post-doctoral fellow who has a PhD in Theoretical or Computational Neuroscience or a related field, with strong programming skills and experience in high-performance computing environments. This role will support a research project led by Dr. Chris Eliasmith in the Centre for Theoretical Neuroscience at the University of Waterloo. Dr. Eliasmith's lab constructs state-of-the-art, large-scale, neuron-level models of a wide variety of behaviours, recently publishing what remains the world's largest functional brain model, Spaun, in Science. These models are simulated in the software Nengo, which is able to run models on a wide variety of hardware platforms, or 'backends', including neuromorphic hardware. Recently, a backend for BlueGene/Q has been developed, allowing Nengo models, including Spaun, to run on the supercomputers housed at SOSCIP. The successful candidate will focus on scaling up models, including Spaun, to take full advantage of these hardware resources. Scaling will include developing theory and implementation of new behaviours, as well as increasing the biological fidelity of Nengo models. A strong publication record, with demonstrated applications of neural-level models to behaviour (e.g. vision, motor control, memory, decision making, etc.), neuron-level compartmental modeling, various applications of learning (deep learning, reinforcement learning, STDP, etc.), and large-scale modeling are greatly desired. Familiarity with Python, MPI, and Javascript would be beneficial. Education and Experience - PhD in Theoretical or Computational Neuroscience, or a related field - strong programming skills and experience in high-performance computing environments - experience working as part of a research team Work Location: Waterloo, Ontario Term of Contract: 2-years maximum IBM is committed to creating a diverse environment and is proud to be an equal opportunity employer. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, gender, gender identity or expression, sexual orientation, national origin, genetics, disability, age, or veteran status. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From dwang at cse.ohio-state.edu Sun Jan 31 11:18:46 2016 From: dwang at cse.ohio-state.edu (DeLiang Wang) Date: Sun, 31 Jan 2016 11:18:46 -0500 Subject: Connectionists: NEURAL NETWORKS, Feb. 2016 Message-ID: <56AE33E6.7070304@cse.ohio-state.edu> Neural Networks - Volume 74, Feb. 2016 http://www.journals.elsevier.com/neural-networks TWSVR: Regression via Twin Support Vector Machine Reshma Khemchandani, Keshav Goyal, Suresh Chandra SIM-ELM: Connecting the ELM model with similarity-function learning Paolo Gastaldo, Federica Bisio, Sergio Decherchi, Rodolfo Zunino Behavioral plasticity through the modulation of switch neurons Vassilis Vassiliades, Chris Christodoulou Event-triggered synchronization strategy for complex dynamical networks with the Markovian switching topologies Aijuan Wang, Tao Dong, Xiaofeng Liao Stability of discrete time recurrent neural networks and nonlinear optimization problems Jayant Singh, Nikita Barabanov Boundedness, Mittag-Leffler stability and asymptotical image-periodicity of fractional-order fuzzy neural networks Ailong Wu, Zhigang Zeng Non-fragile image synchronization of memristor-based neural networks using passivity theory K. Mathiyalagan, R. Anbuvithya, R. Sakthivel, Ju H. Park, P. Prakash Pixel classification based color image segmentation using quaternion exponent moments Xiang-Yang Wang, Zhi-Fang Wu, Liang Chen, Hong-Liang Zheng, Hong-Ying Yang From john.murray at yale.edu Thu Jan 28 10:21:19 2016 From: john.murray at yale.edu (Murray, John) Date: Thu, 28 Jan 2016 15:21:19 +0000 Subject: Connectionists: Computational & Cognitive Neuroscience Summer School, in Shanghai Message-ID: <84E0AE73-7602-48A9-B90B-122524EC4BE3@yale.edu> We are pleased to announce the 6th Computational and Cognitive Neuroscience (CCN) Summer School which will take place July 9-27, 2016, on the campus of NYU-Shanghai in Shanghai, China. Designed to emphasize higher cognitive functions and their underlying neural circuit mechanisms, the course aims at training talented and highly motivated students and postdoctoral fellows from Asia and other countries in the world. Applicants with quantitative (including Physics, Mathematics, Engineering and Computer Science) or experimental background are welcomed. The lectures will introduce the basic concepts and methods, as well as cutting-edge research on higher brain functions such as decision-making, attention, learning and memory. Modeling will be taught at multiple levels, ranging from single neuron computation, microcircuits and large-scale systems, to normative theoretical approach. Python-based programming labs coordinated with the lectures will provide practical training in important computational methods. Course information is available on the CCN official website: www.ccnss.org Applications are being accepted now through the Cold Spring Harbor Asia website: http://www.csh-asia.org/2016meetings/s-cosyne16.html The application deadline is March 15. Organizers: - Xiao-Jing Wang (New York University) - Zach Mainen (Champalimaud Neuroscience Program) - Si Wu (Beijing Normal University) - Eric DeWitt (Champalimaud Neuroscience Program) - John D. Murray (Yale University) Lecturers: - Yang Dan (University of California, Berkeley) - Gustavo Deco (Universitat Pompeu Fabra) - Stanislas Dehaene (College de France) - Bob Desimone (Massachusetts Institute of Technology) - Michael Hausser (University College London) - Quentin Huys (University of Zurich) - Razvan Pascanu (Google) - Philip Sabes (University of California, San Francisco) - Mariano Sigman (Universidad Torcuato Di Tella) - Mike Shadlen (Columbia University) - Misha Tsodyks (Weizmann Institute) - Daniel Yamins (Stanford University) Feel free to direct any questions to: john.murray at yale.edu -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From erik at oist.jp Fri Jan 29 05:28:44 2016 From: erik at oist.jp (Erik De Schutter) Date: Fri, 29 Jan 2016 19:28:44 +0900 Subject: Connectionists: Okinawa/OIST Computational Neuroscience Course 2016: one week left to apply Message-ID: OKINAWA/OIST COMPUTATIONAL NEUROSCIENCE COURSE 2016 Methods, Neurons, Networks and Behaviors June 13 - June 30, 2016 Okinawa Institute of Science and Technology Graduate University, Japan https://groups.oist.jp/ocnc The aim of the Okinawa/OIST Computational Neuroscience Course is to provide opportunities for young researchers with theoretical backgrounds to learn the latest advances in neuroscience, and for those with experimental backgrounds to have hands-on experience in computational modeling. We invite graduate students and postgraduate researchers to participate in the course, held from June 13th through June 30th, 2016 at an oceanfront seminar house of the Okinawa Institute of Science and Technology Graduate University. Applications are through the course web page (https://groups.oist.jp/ocnc) only; January 4 - February 5, 2016. Applicants will receive confirmation of acceptance in March. Like in preceding years, OCNC will be a comprehensive three-week course covering single neurons, networks, and behaviors with ample time for student projects. The first week will focus exclusively on methods with hands-on tutorials during the afternoons, while the second and third weeks will have lectures by international experts. The course has a strong hands-on component based on student proposed modeling or data analysis projects, which are further refined with the help of a dedicated tutor. Applicants are required to propose their project at the time of application. There is no tuition fee. The sponsor will provide lodging and meals during the course and may support travel for those without funding. We hope that this course will be a good opportunity for theoretical and experimental neuroscientists to meet each other and to explore the attractive nature and culture of Okinawa, the southernmost island prefecture of Japan. Invited faculty: ? Erik De Schutter (OIST) ? Sophie Deneve (?cole Normale Sup?rieure, France) ? Kenji Doya (OIST) ? Chris Eliasmith (University of Waterloo, Canada) ? Tomoki Fukai (RIKEN BSI, Japan) ? Michael H?usser (University College London, UK) ? Yukiyasu Kamitani (ATR & Kyoto University, Japan) ? Etienne Koechlin (?cole Normale Sup?rieure, France) ? Bernd Kuhn (OIST) ? Stefan Mihalas (Allen Institute for Brain Science, USA) ? Partha Mitra (Cold Spring Harbor, USA) ? Astrid Prinz (Emory University, USA) ? John Rinzel (New York University, USA) ? Yoko Yazaki-Sugiyama (OIST) From igel at diku.dk Wed Jan 27 15:55:08 2016 From: igel at diku.dk (Christian Igel) Date: Wed, 27 Jan 2016 21:55:08 +0100 Subject: Connectionists: faculty position at University of Copenhagen Message-ID: Hi, We have a faculty opening in data science at the Department of Computer Science, University of Copenhagen (DIKU). Applications from machine learning researchers are very welcome: http://diku.dk/ominstituttet/ledige_stillinger/tenure-track-assistant/ Cheers, Christian -- Prof. Dr. habil. Christian Igel Department of Computer Science University of Copenhagen Sigurdsgade 41 DK-2200 K?benhavn N Homepage: http://image.diku.dk/igel Phone: (+45) 21849673 From dvazquez at cvc.uab.es Fri Jan 29 05:36:40 2016 From: dvazquez at cvc.uab.es (David Vazquez) Date: Fri, 29 Jan 2016 11:36:40 +0100 (CET) Subject: Connectionists: =?utf-8?q?1th_Call_for_Papers_=E2=80=93_CVVT_2016?= =?utf-8?q?_=E2=80=93_7th_international_Workshop_on_Computer_Vision_in_Veh?= =?utf-8?q?icle_Technology_=40_CVPR_2016?= In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <13102017.16119.1454063800116.open-xchange@srvopenx.cvc.uab.es> ******************************************************** CfP - Apologies for multiple copies ******************************************************** CVVT 2016 ? 7th international Workshop on Computer Vision in Vehicle Technology Las Vegas, USA, 26th June 2016 In conjunction with CVPR 2016 Web: http://adas.cvc.uab.es/cvvt2016 ******************************************************** _________________ IMPORTANT DATES _________________ Submission deadline: 18th March 2016 Author notification: 18th April 2016 Camera-ready: 24th April 2016 Workshop: 26th June 2016 ________________ CALL FOR PAPERS ________________ The 7th international Workshop on Computer Vision in Vehicle Technology aims to get together researchers in computer vision to promote discussion and debate on its application to assisted driving, exploration rovers, aerial vehicles and underwater vehicles. We invite the submission of original research contributions in computer vision addressed to: - Autonomous navigation and exploration - Vision-based advanced driver assistance systems - Vision-based underwater and unmanned aerial vehicles - Visual driver monitoring and driver-vehicle interfaces - On-board camera calibration - Performance evaluation of vehicular applications - Machine learning techniques for vehicle technology - Vision based geo-localization The workshop will also host invited talks on assisted driving, exploratory rovers, aerial vehicles and underwater vehicles. ____________ SUBMISSION ____________ Authors should take into account the following: - The submission site is https://cmt.research.microsoft.com/CVVT2016/. - The maximum paper length is 8 pages (plus references). The format of the papers is the same as the CVPR main conference. - We accept dual submissions to CVPR 2016 and CVVT 2016, but the manuscript must contain substantial original contents not submitted to another conference, workshop or journal. - Submissions will be rejected without review if they: contain more than 8 pages (excluding references), violate the double-blind policy or violate the dual-submission policy. - Manuscript templates can be found at the main conference website: http://www.pamitc.org/cvpr16/author_guidelines.php _____________________ BEST PAPER _____________________ The CVVT will award the best student paper of the workshop, voted by the program committee. More details will be provided in the workshop web page. _________ Contact _________ cvvtconference at gmail.com -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From aranoya at gmail.com Wed Jan 27 14:44:59 2016 From: aranoya at gmail.com (Oya Aran) Date: Wed, 27 Jan 2016 20:44:59 +0100 Subject: Connectionists: ICMI 2016 Call for Workshops Message-ID: <97068CBB-FDE3-4638-8994-761381517878@gmail.com> ICMI 2016 Call for Workshops The International Conference on Multimodal Interaction (ICMI) will be held in Tokyo, Japan, during November 12-16, 2016 (http://icmi.acm.org/2016/ ). ICMI is the premier international conference for multidisciplinary research on multimodal human-human and human-computer interaction analysis, interface designs, and system development. ICMI has developed a tradition of hosting workshops on a day around the main conference to further foster the mingling and exchanges around new research, technology, social science models, application and business opportunities. Examples of recent workshops include: - Workshop on Eye Gaze in Intelligent Human Machine Interaction: Eye-Gaze and Multimodality - Workshop on Emotion Representations and Modelling for Human-Computer Interaction System - Workshop on Smart Material Interfaces: Another Step to a Material Future - Workshop on Social Behaviour in Music - Multimodal, Multi-Party, Real-World Human-Robot Interaction - Roadmapping the Future of Multimodal Interaction Research including Business Opportunities and Challenges - Workshop on Advancements in Social Signal Processing for Multimodal Interaction - Workshop on Modeling INTERPERsonal SynchrONy And infLuence INTERPERSONAL - Workshop on Multimodal Deception Detection This tradition will continue at ICMI-2016 and workshops will likely be held on November 16th 2016 after the ICMI main technical program. Of interest are focused workshops on emerging research areas of the main conference topics, and in particular those favouring multi-disciplinary views around application areas, business opportunities, or societal challenges. The format, style, and content of accepted workshops are under the control of the workshop organizers. Workshops may be of a half-day or one day in duration. Workshop organizers will be expected to manage the workshop content, be present to moderate the discussion and panels, invite experts in the domain, and maintain a website for the workshop. Workshop papers will be indexed by ACM. Prospective workshop organizers are invited to submit proposals in PDF format via email to Dr. Julien Epps (j.epps at unsw.edu.au ) and Dr. Gabriel Skantze (gabriel at speech.kth.se ), by February 20th, 2016. The proposal should include the following: - Workshop title, - List of organizers including affiliation, email address, and short bio, - Workshop motivation, expected outcomes and impact, - Workshop format (by invitation only, call for papers, etc), anticipated number of talks/posters, workshop duration (half-day or full-day) including tentative program. - Planned advertisement means, website hosting, and estimated participation - Paper submission procedure (submission via web site, via email, etc.) if applicable. Workshop organizers can rely on the ICMI submission system precisionconference.com , or use their preferred one, e.g. http://cmt.research.microsoft.com/cmt/ - Paper review procedure (single/double-blind, internal/external, solicited/invited-only, pool of reviewers, etc.), - Paper submission and acceptance deadlines (camera-ready and early registration deadlines for a workshop must coincide with the corresponding deadlines of ICMI-2016). - Special space and equipment requests, if any. Important Dates * Workshop proposal: February 20th, 2016 * Workshop acceptance notification: TBA * Camera ready: TBA * Workshop day: November 16th, 2016 -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: