Banbury Center Workshop Series Main Page

Neurocomputational Strategies: From Synapses to Behavior (1998)
Functional Organization of the Thalamus and Cortex and their Interactions (1999)
Toward Animal Models of Attention and Consciousness (2000)
Persistent Neural Activity (2000)
Can a Machine Be Conscious? (2001)
Communication in Brain Systems (2004)
Neurobiology of Decision-Making (2005)
Computational Approaches to Cortical Functions (2006)
New Frontiers in Studies of Nonconscious Processing (2007)
Theoretical and Experimental Approaches to Auditory and Visual Attention (2008)

Theoretical and Experimental Approaches to Auditory and Visual Attention

Sunday, April 20, 2008 to Wednesday, April 23, 2008.

The Banbury Center, Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory, Long Island, NY (http://www.cshl.edu/banbury/index.html)

Sponsored by the Swartz Foundation (http://www.theswartzfoundation.org)

Organizers

John H. Reynolds

The Salk Institute for Biological Studies

Jonathan B. Fritz

University of Maryland

Conference Overview

Research in the human and macaque has provided a wealth of information on the neural mechanisms that mediate visual attention. Recent psychoacoustic and neurophysiological studies of attention in the auditory system, and research on interactions of visual and auditory attention, have added considerably to this picture. These studies have found parallels with visual attention mechanisms but have also raised new questions, such as the role of adaptive plastic changes in spectrotemporal receptive field shape during selective attention and the nature of the coordination of attention-driven changes at multiple processing levels from cochlea to cortex. The inherently temporal nature of auditory stimuli has also led to interesting insights into the temporal dynamics of auditory attention. The purpose of this workshop is to bring together experimentalists and theoreticians working in auditory and visual attention for a vibrant discussion of current research. We anticipate that this will encourage an exciting and valuable exchange of ideas, new insights and synthesis, and sharing of perspectives on how best to advance our understanding of the biological basis of attention.

Program

Sunday, 20 April

Afternoon Arrival at Robertson House, Banbury Center, for registration and room

Assignment

6:00 pm

Reception at Robertson House

7:30 pm

Dinner at Robertson House

Monday, 21 April

7:15-8:15 am

Breakfast at Robertson House

8:30-8:35 am

Jan A. Witkowski, Banbury Center, Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory, Cold

Spring Harbor, New York: Introductory remarks.

8:35-8:45 am

John H. Reynolds, The Salk Institute For Biological Studies, La Jolla,

California and Jonathan B. Fritz, University of Maryland, College Park: Introductory remarks.

8:45-11:45 am

SESSION 1: Experimental and Theoretical perspectives on Attention

Chair: Robert Desimone, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge

8:45-9:05 am

Ken Nakayama, Harvard University, Cambridge, Massachusetts: Perception, cognition and action.

9:05-9:15 am

Discussion

9:15-9:35 am

Steven A. Hillyard, University of California San Diego, La Jolla: Attention facilitates multiple features in parallel in human visual cortex.

9:35-9:45 am

Discussion

9:45-10:05 am

John Duncan, MRC Cognition & Brain Sciences Unit, Cambridge, United

Kingdom: Selective behavior and selective attention in the human and monkey brain.

10:05-10:15 am

Discussion

10:15-10:45 am

Break

10:45-11:05 am

Robert H. Wurtz, National Eye Institute, NIH, Bethesda, Maryland: Visual gateway to cortex and its guardian attention in the LGN and TRN.

11:05-11:15 am

Discussion

11:15-11:35 am

Marisa Carrasco, New York University, New York: Effects of spatial and feature-based attention: Psychophysical and neuroimaging studies.

11:35-11:45 am

Discussion

12:00 pm

Luncheon at Robertson House

1:30-2:30 pm

SESSION 1: Experimental and Theoretical perspectives on Attention (Cont’d.)

Chair: Laurent Itti, University of Southern California, Los Angeles

1:30-1:50 pm

Laurence F. Abbott, Columbia University, New York: Gating of multiple signals through attentional modulation.

1:50-2:00 pm

Discussion

2:00-2:20 pm

David Heeger, New York University, New York: The normalization model of attention.

2:20-2:30 pm

Discussion

2:30-6:00 pm

SESSION 2: Auditory Attention: Human

Chair: Shihab A. Shamma, University of Maryland, College Park

2:30-2:50 pm

Robert J. Zatorre, McGill University, Montreal, Canada: Functional organization of human auditory cortex: Bottom-up features and topdown processes.

2:50-3:00 pm

Discussion

3:00-3:20 pm

Ervin Hafter, University of California, Berkeley: A role for memory in shared attention.

3:20-3:30 pm

Discussion

3:30-3:50 pm

Robert Carlyon, MRC Cognition & Brain Sciences, Cambridge, United

Kingdom: Effects of attention on auditory scene analysis.

3:50-4:00 pm

Discussion

3/6 4:00-4:30 pm

Break

4:30-4:50 pm

Barbara Shinn-Cunningham, Boston University, Massachusetts: The costs of switching auditory attention.

4:50-5:00 pm

Discussion

5:00-5:20 pm

Claude Alain, Rotman Research Institute of Baycrest Centre, Ontario, Canada: Top-down influences on memory and response-related activity for sound

location (dual pathways, parietal cortex and spatial memory).

5:20-5:30 pm

Discussion

5:30-6:00 pm

General Discussion

6:15 pm

Reception at Robertson House

7:00 pm

Dinner at Robertson House

Tuesday, 22 April

7:15-8:15 am

Breakfast at Robertson House

9:00-11:00 am

SESSION 3: Visual Attention I: Theory and Experiment

Chair: Robert H. Wurtz, National Eye Institute, NIH, Bethesda, Maryland

9:00-9:20 am

Stefan Treue, German Primate Center, Goettingen, Germany: Spatial, feature, and object based attention in area MT.

9:20-9:30 am

Discussion

9:30-9:50 am

Laurent Itti, University of Southern California, Los Angeles: Quantifying bottom-up and top-down influences on gaze allocation in humans and monkeys.

9:50-10:00 am

Discussion

10:00-10:20 am

Leonardo Chelazzi, University of Verona Medical School, Italy: Mechanisms of feature-selective attention in area V4 of the macaque (taskrelevance of responses in V4).

10:20-10:30 am

Discussion

10:30-11:00 am

Break

11:00-12:30 pm

SESSION 4: Auditory Attention I: Neurophysiology of Auditory Attention

Chair: Robert Carlyon, MRC Cognition & Brain Sciences, Cambridge, United

Kingdom

11:00-11:20 am

Tony Zador, Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory, New York: Two components of attentional modulation in rat auditory cortex.

11:20-11:30 am

Discussion

11:30-11:50 am

Shihab A. Shamma, University of Maryland, College Park: Attention and rapid plasticity in auditory cortex.

11:50-12:00 pm

Discussion

12:00-12:20 pm

Jonathan B. Fritz, University of Maryland, College Park: What is the contribution of frontal cortex to an auditory attentional network?

12:20-12:30 pm

Discussion

12:45 pm

Luncheon at Robertson House

2:00-4:00 pm

SESSION 5: Visual Attention II

Chair: Ken Nakayama, Harvard University, Cambridge, Massachusetts

2:00-2:20 pm

Wilson S. Geisler, University of Texas at Austin: Mechanisms of fixation selection evaluated using ideal observer analysis.

2:20-2:30 pm

Discussion

2:30-2:50 pm

Julio C. Martinez Trujillo, McGill University, Montreal, Canada: Attentional modulation of sensory inputs at the level of single neurons in MT.

2:50-3:00 pm

Discussion

3:00-3:20 pm

Patrick Cavanagh, Harvard University, Cambridge, Massachusetts: Object-based integration and moving attention.

3:20-3:30 pm

Discussion

3:30-4:00 pm

Break

4:00-6:00 pm

SESSION 6: Cell Type Specificity

Chair: Leonardo Chelazzi, University of Verona Medical School, Italy

4:00-4:20 pm

John H. Reynolds, The Salk Institute for Biological Studies, La Jolla,

California: Mapping the microcircuitry of attention.

4:20-4:30 pm

Discussion

4:30-4:50 pm

Jude Mitchell, The Salk Institute, San Diego, California: Attention-dependent response modulation varies between cell classes in macaque V4.

4:50-5:00 pm

Discussion

5:00-5:20 pm

Xiao-Jing Wang, Yale University School of Medicine, New Haven, Connecticut: Stochastic and synchronous neural circuit dynamics underlying attentional gain

modulation.

5:20-5:30 pm

Discussion

5:30-6:00 pm

General Discussion

6:15 pm

Reception at Robertson House

7:00 pm

Dinner at Robertson House

Wednesday, 23 April

7:15-8:15 am

Breakfast at Robertson House