This is a basic course targeted to those without neuroscience background, or those who need to refresh knowledge of key concepts to prepare for more advanced courses in Neuroscience.
This will serve as a pre-requisite for several Neuroscience courses. All neuroscience students need to pass this course before going on to other courses, unless they can demonstrate that they have already mastered the topics by passing the exam.
Assessment will be in the form of an exam at the end. This is not meant to be a stressful experience, but an opportunity for all students to demonstrate the understanding of the materials in their own words. In the exam, each lecturer will submit a short question based on the lecture content and the reading materials indicated in the course description. Each answer should be about 100 words long. Some questions may bridge lecture materials from two or more lectures. Students will be expected to answer all questions. A pass is 50%.
Students with prior knowledge but wishing to attend a part of the course will be allowed to audit.
Week |
Topic |
Suggested textbook ref |
Lecturer |
Week starting on |
Keywords / concepts to cover |
1 |
Cell biology basics |
|
Ichiro |
17-Sep |
|
2 |
Neurobiology concepts (building blocks - neurons, morphology) |
Purves |
Gordon |
23-Sep |
|
3 |
Organisation of the nervous system/neuroanatomy |
Purves |
Izumi Fukunaga |
30-Sep |
|
4 |
Bioelectricity |
Purves |
Jeff Wickens |
07-Oct |
|
5 |
Synapses |
Purves |
Erik De Schutter |
14-Oct |
|
|
Study week (SfN annual meeting) |
||||
6 |
Circuits |
Purves |
Yoe Uusisaari |
28-Oct |
|
|
Learning and memory, Mechanisms |
Purves |
Yoko Sugiyama |
04-Nov |
|
7 |
Learning and memory, Behavioural aspects |
|
Gail Tripp |
11-Nov |
|
8 |
Evolution and Developmental neurobiology |
Purves |
Ichiro Masai |
18-Nov |
Genetic program for regional patterning in the brain Neurogenesis Neuronal polarity
|
9 |
Methodology 101 |
Carter, Shieh
|
Bernd Kuhn |
25-Nov |
|
10 |
Introduction to theoretical and computational neuroscience |
Dayan/Abbott |
L1: Tomoki Fukai L2: Jun Tani |
02-Dec |
|
11 |
Machine learning basics |
Dayan/Abbott |
L1: Tomoki Fukai L2: Kenji Doya |
09-Dec |
|
12 |
Exam |
|
|
|
|
no prerequisites