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In
1986, a unique confluence of ideas, people, and recent scientific
and technological developments came together at Caltech, giving
rise to a new interdisciplinary graduate program: Computation
and Neural Systems (CNS). The CNS program concentrates on the
fascinating problems at the interface between cellular biology,
neurobiology, electrical engineering, computer science, and physics.
Its unifying theme is the relationship between the physical structure
of a computational system (physical or biological hardware), the
dynamics of its operation, and the problems that it can solve.
CNS students and faculty have carried out groundbreaking work
in a range of fields, including computer science, electrical and
neuromorphic engineering, neural networks, robotics, biophysics,
neurophysiology, and artificial life.
Over
the weekend of September 30th, Carver Mead (BS '56, MS '57, PhD
'60, Moore Professor of Engineering and Applied Science, Emeritus),
John Hopfield (Dickinson Professor of Chemistry and Biology, Emeritus),
and David Van Essen (BS '67, Edison Professor of Neurobiology
at Washington University in St. Louis)--the visionaries who created
and shaped CNS into what would become the first program of its
kind, spawning intellectual tentacles that now reach worldwide--brought
their unique world views back to campus, re-inspiring two generations
of students and colleagues to continue with the revolutionary
work incubated at Caltech just 15 years ago. Along with dozens
of alumni who were in town for the two-day birthday bash, current
students, faculty, and friends (over 130 in all) shared meals,
shared stories, and "talked shop."
"This
turned out to be a wonderful opportunity to bring everybody back
to campus and to hear about achievements over the past 15 years,"
observed Christof Koch, Troendle Professor of Cognitive and Behavioral
Biology and Professor of Computation and Neural Systems. Professor
Koch was responsible for organizing the event and noted that he
was pleased so many people made the trek back to campus to meet
with old friends and share ideas.
Many
alumni gave talks on topics ranging from the very technical--"Neuromimetic
Vision Algorithms"--to the very topical--"Five Jobs in Five Years:
A View from the Trenches in Silicon Valley." Among those giving
presentations were Alex Backer (MS '98, currently working on his
PhD); Vance Bjorn (MS '95, now with Digital Persona, a company
which he co-founded); Tobi Delbruck (PhD '93, currently at the
Institute of Neuroinformatics in Zurich); Dawei Dong (PhD '91,
currently teaching and doing research at the Center for Complex
Systems and Brain Sciences in Boca Raton, Florida); Laurent Itti
(PhD '00, now assistant professor of Computer Science at the University
of Southern California); Sanjoy Mahajan (PhD '98, currently doing
post-doctoral work in physics at the University of Cambridge);
David McKay (PhD '92, currently a Reader in the Department of
Physics at Cambridge University); Bill Softky (PhD '93, emeritus
of five Silicon Valley companies in five years); and Jiajun Dale
Wen (PhD '00, currently with Oracle Corporation).
Erik
Winfree (PhD '98), Assistant Professor of Computer Science at
Caltech, gave a talk entitled "From Neurons to Molecules: Computing
the Natural Way." Also speaking were visiting professor Heinz
Schuster (Chair for Theoretical Physics at the University of Kiel
and regular visiting faculty member at Caltech every second year)
and Dr. Chris Adami (Faculty Associate in Computation and Neural
Systems at Caltech and Research Scientist at JPL). On hand as
well was Professor Thanos Siapas, who will shortly be moving from
MIT to Caltech to take an assistant professorship. He will be
a member of both the Division of Engineering and Applied Science
and the Division of Biology. His presentation was titled "The
Organization of Network Interactions Across Cortico-Hippocampal
Circuits and Their Role in Memory Formation," and his expertise
involves recording and analyzing the neural activity of hundreds
of individual neurons in parts of the mammalian brain thought
to be involved in memory and spatial orientation.
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