ProfessorSimon Schultz

I am interested in how memory works in the brain, and how we can develop treatments for memory disorders.

The main research interests of my group are how brain-wide networks support the storage of information into, and recall from, the mammalian brain’s memory systems. A key question is the how memories are reorganised in the brain over time as they are embedded into long term memory – we know that they go from being dependent on the hippocampus to independent of it, and that they are restructured within the neocortex to become more “abstract” or semantic in nature. I view this, with my engineer’s hat on, as a form of information compression – evolution’s way of dealing with the fact that the brain has a finite memory capacity. We study these questions at levels ranging from synapses, neurons, circuits and brain-wide networks to behaviour.

We develop and use new tools to study these questions – this includes optical technology for studying brain networks, novel mouse behavioural techniques suitable for large-scale optical brain imaging, and new data analysis tools for studying neural population dynamics based on information theory and graph theory.

Key Scientific and Technological Achievements
• Development of information-theoretic methods for decomposing the information content of neural spike trains into distinct coding mechanisms, leading to advances such as the demonstration of spike timing coding in the somatosensory system
• Use of network theory to uncover new mechanisms of memory encoding, such as how old memories are restructured to take into account new information learned
• Development of neurotechnologies including two-photon targeted robotic patch-clamp electrophysiology, the mapping of hippocampal place cells in head-fixed mice using a floating behavioural platform, and mesoscopic imaging of activity from 10,000 neurons simultaneously in mice performing cognitive tasks

Key External Collaborations
• Richard Morris (University of Edinburgh)
• Ksenia Kastanenka (Harvard/MGH, USA)
• Spencer Smith (UCSB, USA)

• Yan Gong, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Suzhou