Technological advances in the body and mind

Why do we get angry? Aggression is one of our oldest evolutionary traits—a survival mechanism to assert dominance and defend against rivals. These impulses don’t come out of thin air; they’re orchestrated by an almond-sized "master switchboard" in the brain: the hypothalamus in mice. Despite its tiny size, this region regulates our most primal instincts.
In this talk, we’ll explore how a specific group of neurons in the mouse brain acts as a gatekeeper for these aggressive sparks. To crack this code, we use brain slices in mice to keep this social software running under a microscope. I’ll take you behind the scenes of whole-cell electrophysiology, where we use a glass needle thinner than a human hair to physically fuse with a single neuron and record its electrical heartbeat.
We’ll also discuss how patterned optogenetics lets us play these neurons like piano keys with light, and how calcium imaging reveals how the brain’s switchboard processes information at a microscopic scale. Finally, we’ll look at how the latest research in mice is using these tools to understand how we might override aggressive behaviours and what happens when we try to repair one of the most complex systems we know: the brain.

It seems like the topic of dopamine is everywhere these days. Ideas and advice concerning one's dopamine levels have extensively permeated social media and modern discourse. But how can we actually measure dopamine release in real time? What are the new technologies which allow us to measure dopamine and other chemicals in the brain? What are the benefits and drawbacks, and how might these technologies help us answer fundamental questions about dopamine's function in the brain?

In the world of increasing digitalization, Extended Reality (XR) is poised to play an important role. XR introduces different ways of interaction with digital content, for example, for entertainment and work, but it also explores different contexts, such as stationary and dynamic. In this talk, we will explore different examples around the question of "What is XR really good for?" Can we play games in XR while walking? Can XR help us simulate experiences as realistically as possible? Can we have fun with XR, or is it constant frustration?