bcs newsletter - fall 2008

8/8/2019 BCS Newsletter - Fall 2008

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bcs newsall 2008

Massachusetts

Institute o

Technology

contentsp.02A Message rom the

Department Head

p.03Intelligence Initiative to Link

BCS, Other Departments in

Common Purpose

p.05BCS Straw Dogs Complete

Dominating Season

p.06Faculty Profle: Rebecca Saxe

p.10

First Year Graduate StudentsAspire to Hollywood Greatness


2/12

I am, perhaps, more surprised than many o you to nd mysel writing

another message or the BCS newsletter.Ater much discussion andthinking, I agreed to take on a third term as Department Head beginning in

July o this year. This was not a decision made lightly and was based in largemeasure on the encouragement o many o the aculty in the department as

well as the desire to see a number o important eorts through to conclusion.I will thereore make use o these ew words to tell you about two matters that

are o crucial importance to BCS and that will have the highest ocus in theearly years o this new term.

The rst eort that we have undertaken is to establish a signicantlyenhancedand permanentoundation or the departments educational

mission. One o the rst points o discussion in planning or a third term wasbringing more aculty resources to bear in the governance and development o

the Course 9 undergraduate major and the BCS graduate program.I am very pleased to tell you, thereore, that Proessor Matthew Wilson

has agreed to join the BCS leadership as Associate Department Head orEducation. Matt brings extensive experience and energy to this new role,

having been or many years one o our best-regarded teachers and also, morerecently, the chair o the BCS graduate program.

And Matt has certainly hit the ground running. In the last ew weeks, hehas established a new Education Committee, conducted initial meetings,

and has sought aculty approval or and implemented a number o importantchanges. Given the traction that this committee has already attained, I have no

doubt that there will be a steady drumbeat o improvements in graduate andundergraduate education.

One particularly exciting development is a new joint program in molecular

and cellular neuroscience that will allow graduate students in BCS and Biology

to move reely across department boundaries to work in the lab or which theyare best suited. Thanks are due to aculty member Troy Littleton and AssociateDean o Science Hazel Sive or their leadership and support o this eort.

With this program in place, MIT will be able to oer an even greater range oopportunities to incoming students in this area, thereby greatly enhancing our

competitiveness.Another key ocus will be to expand our resource development eorts.

Over the years, you have read in this newsletter o our increasingly successulresearch programs in disorders and diseases o the brain. These programs,

which collectively we term the Brain Disorders Initiative, have attracted a loto attention and, importantly, much direct support or this important research.

I expect that the Brain Disorders Initiative will continue to grow and become acentral organizing theme in the departments research across levels o analysis.

More recently, BCS aculty members Josh Tenenbaum and TomasoPoggio, in conjunction with colleagues throughout MIT, have advanced a

proposal that would bring together researchers in a number o related eldsunder a new eort termed the Intelligence Initiative. Do take a ew minutes

to read the article on I2 elsewhere in this newsletter; I think you will nd itsmission an exciting new way to bring recent discoveries in cognitive science

and neuroscience to bear on next-generation advances in articial intelligence.It also represents an example o the leading-edge thinking that continues to

characterize our department.

A Message rom the Department Head

Mriganka Sur

Editorial Board

John ArmstrongKathleen DickeyKi GoosensAnn Olson

Judith RauchwargerPawan Sinha

Additional WritingDeborah Halber

Please keepin touch:

[email protected]

p.02

On the Cover2 photon microscopy

reveals the structure

o a zebra nch brain

nucleus. Blood vessels

are labeled with

sulorhodamine (red)

and neurons with Fast

Blue fuorescent dye.

Image by Benjamin

Scott, Lois Lab and

Tim Gardner, Fee Lab

One o our frst

eorts will be

to establish a

signifcantly

enhanced

oundation or

the departmentseducational

mission


3/12

What is intelligence? Books have been written about

it; great minds have puzzled over it; philosophers havewrestled with this question or centuries.

An Intelligence Initiative (I2) at MIT incorporating aculty

across the Institutes ve schools whose work bears

on the nature o intelligencein humans or animals, inmachines or molecules, in cultural or collective settingswould bring a ormidable amount o brainpower to bear on

this question, said Tomaso A. Poggio, Eugene McDermottProessor in the Brain Sciences.

The goal would be to bring together researchers indierent schools and disciplines at MIT who share the

common goals o understanding the nature o intelligenceand developing tools to elucidate it; how the brain

generates it, and how it could be replicated in machines.This is an idea people around the Institute are

interested in, Poggio said. For me, what was originallyexciting about such an initiative was the realization that

neuroscience is at the point at which it is very useul toother elds, such as computer science, and especially

articial intelligence.This excitement is at the heart o a larger convergence

o ideas and goals across many disciplines, blurringboundaries between biological and physical sciences,

social and behavioral sciences, mathematics andengineering, said Joshua B. Tenenbaum, Associate

Proessor in BCS. For instance, new imaging technologiesare bridging the gap between purely behavioral studies

o cognition and modern neuroscience. Mathematicaltechniques that originated in AI, such as probabilistic

reasoning in belie networks and statistical learning

theory, have become key tools or modeling the mind and

brain. Conversely, computational models o biologicalintelligence are leading to new systems or machine

intelligence. A model o the brains visual system

developed by the Poggio laboratory to mimic propertieso neurons in the cortex, or instance, turned out to be

as good as state-o-the-art computer-vision systems

at recognizing complex scenes. Models o how human

children discover and organize systems o concepts,developed in the Tenenbaum laboratory, have led tonew algorithms or unsupervised machine learning that

advance the state o the art in AI.

Recent progress in biology, engineering, mathematics,statistics and the social sciences make this perhaps the

most exciting time ever to be studying the mind, saidBCS Associate Proessor Pawan Sinha. On the biological

side, neuroscience and genetics are generating newtools at a rapid pace, yielding new insights into cognitive

structure, unction, and development that we could nothave imagined a decade ago. MIT is unquestionably a

world leader in these biological approaches to studyingthe mind, but what makes MIT unique comes rom the

contributions o a dozen distinct disciplines and their

potential or ruitul interaction.

Just as a critical mass o researchers make up the MITEnergy Initiativean Institute-wide eort to help

Researchers working on

cognition and intelligence

have much to gain by

interacting with each other

and with BCS

bcs news all 2008 p.03

Intelligence Initiative to Link BCS,

Other Departments in Common Purpose

Pawan Sinha


4/12

transorm the global energy systemMIT has diverseresources throughout the Institute tackling questions

surrounding intelligence.

Researchers across the institute who might not think

o themselves primarily as cognitive scientists do criticalwork related to the larger questions o cognition andintelligence, said Tenenbaum. These aculty and students

have much to gain and much to oer by interacting witheach other and with BCS aculty studying intelligence,

across departmental and school lines.In addition to some twenty aculty in BCS who study

intelligence rom cognitive, computational or neuralperspectives, MIT research ocuses on intelligence

across many other units o the Institute, including theComputer Science and Articial Intelligence Laboratory,

the Sloan School o Management, the Media Lab, thedepartments o Electrical Engineering and Computer

Science; Mechanical Engineering; Biological Engineering;Economics; Linguistics and Philosophy; Political

Science; Biology; Mathematics and Physics; the Science,Technology and Society program, and the Computational

and Systems Biology initiative.

Research under way at MIT includesmajor eorts on:

Visual perception

How does the mind perceive itsphysical surroundings rom visual

input, and how can human-like

machine vision systems be based on

these principles? BCS researchers,electrical engineers and computerscientists work together on models

o attention and scene perception;surace perception; style and

content actors in perception; andcomputational models or studying

the neural circuits underlying objectrecognition.

Motor control

How does the brain controlmovements and learn to do so?

Consider practicing how to hit atennis ball. Having learned to play a

specic shot, you must then be ableto use it under novel conditions

adapting to changes in the spinon the incoming ball, the speed

and direction o your opponentsshots, and the position o your body with respect to the

ball. The study o behavior has a long tradition at MITo collaborations across the School o Science and the

School o Engineering.

Mathematics o learning and inerence

MIT researchers across multiple schools are working on

undamental mathematical principles o learning rom data

and inerence under uncertainty. Through collaborations,these researchers could potentially apply methods rom

one discipline to basic learning problems explored in other

disciplines.

Memory and its use in everyday reasoning

How is human common-sense knowledge about the

physical and social world organized in memory andprocessed in everyday reasoning to make plausible

inerences rapidly and seemingly eortlessly? Howcan we endow machines withthese same capacities?

Researchers in several laboratories are studying thestructure, organization and ecient processing o

knowledge.

Language structure and acquistion

How is human knowledge o language structured and

acquired, and how can we build computer systems withhuman-like language capacities? What knowledge is or

must be built in a priori, and what knowledge is or canbe learned rom natural language data? What aspects

o linguistic knowledge are shared with other cognitivedomains or other non-human species? MIT researchers

are working on these central questions, which can beasked about all aspects o language, including phonology,

morphology, syntax, semantics, and pragmatics.

Social cognition and moral judgment

How do we understand the behavior o other people in

terms o the mental statesthe belies, desires, plans,

values, eelingsthat give rise to their behavior? How

do we judge the moral status o actions that one persontakes towards another, or decide what course o actionis best in morally ambiguous situations? These questions

represent some o the most exciting current directionsin cross-disciplinary cognitive science and EECS,

philosophy and Sloan.The growth o computing and networking has

launched the eld o collective intelligence in socialsystems. Phenomena o collective intelligence and social

networking are becoming increasingly important inshaping public access to inormation, culture, healthcare,

government and politics.

Intelligent hardwareWhat circuit-level properties o the brain are responsible

or the astonishing combination o speed and accuracyseen in human perception and cognition? Are there

general principles o hardware design that might underliebiological and articial intelligence, and that could lead

to more ecient and scalable learning and inerencecircuits or AI? To what extent can adaptive processes in

biology at the cellular and molecular level be describedas intelligent and characterized in computational terms?

MIT researchers studying cognition and intelligence inhardware include those in BCS, EECS, the Media Lab,

Biology and Physics.

continued rom p.03

Neuroscience is at

the point at whichit is very useul to

other feldsTomaso Poggio

p.04


5/12

I you ask BCS Associate Proessor Chris Moore, winning the league championship is just the cherry on the

sundae. It is very simple, he says enthusiastically, the Straw Dogs are all about community.His enthusiasm or spending time with members o all actions o the department does not change the act that the

BCS Straw Dogs won their division in MITs summer sotball league. The team dominated the regular season with arecord o 9-1, and the nal game against the Biohazards had both players and spectators biting their nails until the very

end. Down three runs ater the rst inning, they managed to make it to the nal inning up by the same amount. That iswhen the game got really interesting. It was just a series o bad breaks or us that the Biohazards crawled back and tied

the game in the top o the nal inning, says Moore who has played with the team since its inception our years ago.The Dogs had one nal chance to take home the

championship in the bottom o the last inning. Thedening moment came when, ater two outs, the bases

were loaded, and Gabrieli lab post-doc Oliver Hindsone

o the teams strongest hitterswas up at bat. Hearts

sank when he hit a ground ball right to the opposingteams player, but rose again as the throw to second waso the mark and Tim Buschman ran home to score the

walk-o run and the win.This season, the team was captained by Jason

Cromer, a postdoc in the Miller lab. When asked aboutwhat made this year special, Chris Moore highlights

Cromers leadership and coaching as key elements in theteams improved playing. Not only were we having un,

he says, describing the beginning o the season, we weregetting better.

John Armstrong, Administrative Ocer in BCSheadquarters, seconds this. Jason put together a

balanced lineup that really worked, he says. The teamdemonstrated good orm right rom the beginning o

the season, with strong oense all through the order, anexcellent ineld, and an outeld that stole a lot o runs

rom the opposing teams.Successes aside, the members o the team value the

camaraderie and satisaction o playing together aboveall else. We could be 0-11, says Moore, and we would

still have that. He credits, in part, the teams commitmentto enjoying themselves to John Armstrong, who managed

the team in its second year. Armstrong made everyonesign a contract agreeing to go out or social time as a

team ater each game.

What sets this team apart rom others is its sense o

inclusion. The players are students, aculty, sta andcontinued on back cover

Pro. Ted Gibson and PostdoctoralAssociate Evelina Fedorenko are tobe married on October 25, 2008.

Lee Mavros, Coordinator o the

Simons Program, and Christopher

Rushton were engaged on May

19, 2007. They are planning aspring 2009 wedding in Hanover,

Pennsylvania.

Administrative Assistant Michelle

Potak and David Lahey were

married on September 27, 2008.

Proessor Laura Schulz and partner

Sue Kauman welcomed daughter

Adele Rosalie Kauman-Schulz,born on November 18th.

Isabella Gabrieli was born on May

28th to ather, Proessor John

Gabrieli, mother Research Scientist

Susan Whiteld-Gabrieli, and bigsister, Christina.

Graduate student Sally Kwok

married Edmond Lee (a Googleemployee) on December 28, 2007on the Big Island o Hawaii.

Postdoctoral Associate MehmetCansev and his wieAsumanwelcomed their second daughter

Sede on February 23.

Postdoctoral Associate Thomas

Serre and wieAlison Tovar

welcomed their rst child, adaughter they named Lia GabrielleSerre-Tovar, on September 19th.

Grad Student ChristopherHirschmarried JennierTsang on January

1, 2008.

Postdoctoral Associate Noa

Oen and husband JulianWong

welcomed their rst child, a boy, onApril 30. The babys name is Goni

Guan Yi Wong.

On May 5 new parents ResearchScientist Sheeba Arnold Anteraperand Shibu Anteraper welcomedson Samuel.

New Beginnings

BCS Straw Dogs Complete Dominating

Season, Win League Championship

2008 league champion Straw Dogs. From l to r:

(standing) Mike Long, Tim Buschman, Reuben

Goodman, Cal Perez, Oliver Hinds, Brian DePasquale,

Retsina Meyer, Chris Moore, John Armstrong, JeersonRoy, Alexis Bradshaw, Najib Majaj

(kneeling/lying) Sam Cooke, Jason Cromer, Hayami

Arakawa, Kristin MacCully, Jenn Cromer.



6/12

At any given moment, most people harbor

within them a number o potentially

disjointedand sometimes conficting

ambitions. But i you have ever wondered howthe desire to conduct eld-leading research in

cognitive neuroscience can peaceully coexistwith dreams o running a bed and breakast, then

you just have to meet BCS Assistant ProessorRebecca Saxe.

For as long as she can rememberandRebecca conesses to having an imperect autobiographical memoryher goal has been to

be a scientist. With parents who are both lawyers, another direction might have been seemedmore natural, but there was a lot o amily support and experience in the sciences. Her mother,

in act, had intended to become a chemist, but a tendency to break things in the lab caused herproessors to encourage another career path.

Beore she could become a scientist, however, Rebecca had to navigate an educationalsystem that did not ully engage her. I spent my whole childhood looking orward to going to

college because Ive always thought o it as this place where you got to study things that wereat the edge o possibility. She began her ormal preparations at age 12 when her mother gave

her the course catalog or Dalhousie University as a git. Within a matter o days, Rebecca hadtraced back the prerequisites or all o the advanced genetics classes (her interest at the time)

and had developed a comprehensive ve-year plan or her education. I was really anxious togo to college, she notes.

Rebecca ended up abandoning her meticulous course schedule when she was admittedto Oriel College, one o Oxord Universitys oldest member institutions and one o the last to

admit women. For someone who had so thoroughly planned every aspect o her education,

Rebecca ound the unstructured orm o Oxords tutorial system empowering. I am really

grateul that I got to go to Oxord because it suited me perectly and in a very deep way that Icouldnt have had anywhere else in the world, she says. I was given an extraordinary amounto responsibility or my own education and I elt like there was no limit on what I could learn.

One attraction o Oxord was the reedom to specialize in both arts and sciences. Rebeccachose to study the three PsPsychology, Physiology, and Philosophy. While there, she also

gained her rst research experience as an undergraduate in Kia Nobres lab studying attentionand memory. Nobre had previously avoided taking undergraduates, but she took a chance with

Rebecca. I guess I looked keen, she notes, which I was. The experience was a valuable oneand Rebecca cites Nobre as a major infuence in her lie and career.

Oxord also was rich in non-academic activities. Rebeccas rst year ound her directinga radio play and rowing competitively. Later, she engaged in competitive ballroom dancing,

competing in eight dances (quickstep was her specialty) on the university circuit in England andin Florida. But these activities never overshadowed her scientic aspirationswhen the dance

competition in Florida was scheduled the same week her graduate applications were due,Rebecca danced by day and completed applications late into the night.

Rebecca came to BCS as a graduate student or two primary reasons. O the places Iapplied, I was most proud o getting into MIT, she says. That was reason number one. The

other reason was the interest shown by BCS aculty member, and now peer, Nancy Kanwisher.In describing the support and guidance that Nancy has provided over the last ten years,

Rebecca is eusive. I have a volatile emotional response to science; I get very up when itsgoing well and very down when its not. Nancy has always been able to remind me o why I am

a scientist. I couldnt have done it without her.Rebeccas graduate work (with Nancy Kanwisher, o course) on the neural basis o social

cognition earned her an early reputation as someone to watch. Ater completing her doctorate,she spent three years as a Junior Fellow at Harvard, working with Susan Carey on the

development o social cognition and causal reasoning in inancy.

BCS reclaimed Rebecca as a aculty member in 2006, and she continues in the same area

o research. Building on work she started here as a graduate student, she studies what is calledTheory o Mindthe mechanism by which people iner and reason about others states o mind.

Faculty Prole:

Rebecca Saxe

Rebecca, at right, scuba diving with

husband Allan Adams

I think its the

deepest puzzle in

science that we

have these neurons

in a computing

machine and that

they can represent

and compute

abstract thoughts

p.06


7/12

Her research makes use o MRI to look at the group o brain regions in human cortex thatunderlie this mechanism. Rebecca, however, regards Theory o Mind as just a case study, albeitan important one, in a much broader question. I want to know how the human brain implements

abstract thinking, she says. I think its the deepest puzzle in science that we have theseneurons in a computing machine and that they can represent and compute abstract thoughts.

As busy as the lie o an Assistant Proessor is, Rebecca still enjoys a rich variety oexperiences outside o the lab. Just over a year ago, she married Allan Adams, whom she met

when they were both Junior Fellows at Harvard. Allan is an Assistant Proessor in MITs Physicsdepartment studying String Theory. Together, they share a number o activities including hiking,

bicycling, fying gliders (real as well as radio-controlled), and cookingespecially breakast. Ilove breakast, says Rebecca. Every possible version o breakast is, I think, antastic.

And the bed and breakast? Its an escape antasy, she laughs. I dont mind doing laundryand I really love to cook breakast and those are the two most important skills at a B and B.

The escape, however, may not come so easily. The problem is that i you play the antasy outto month two, Allan and I are sitting in the back room reading papers. I guess that means I still

really want to be a scientist.

The BCS Summer Social

Fun in the sun or amilies,

dogs, and Straw Dogs.



8/12

Noteworthy

FacultyEmery Brown was one osix MIT aculty members to

be named a Fellow o theInstitute o Electrical and

Electronics Engineers (IEEE).In October, Brown was

also named a Fellow o theAmerican Association or the

Advancement o Science.

Bob Desimone was named tothe newly endowed Doris and

Don Berkey Proessorship.

John Gabrieli and Nancy

Kanwisher were awarded an

$8.5 million Ellison MedicalFoundation grant to study

the brain basis o autism anddyslexia.

Yasunori Hayashi received

both the Japanese Societyor the Promotion o Science

(JSPS) Prize and the Japan

Academy Medal or his work

on molecular mechanisms ohippocampal synaptic plasticity.

Earl Millers paper, AnIntegrative Theory o Prerontal

Cortex Function (Miller andCohen, 2001) was designated

a Current Classic by ThomsonScientic or being among

the most cited papers inNeuroscience and Behavior.

Elly Nedivi received the Julie

Martin Mid-career Award inAging Research rom the Ellison

Medical Foundation and AFAR.

The BCS Fall 2007 Award orExcellence in UndergraduateTeaching (Faculty) was given to

Aude Oliva.

Tomaso Poggio was thetutorial speaker at NIPS

(Neural Inormation ProcessingSystems), December 2007.

Rebecca Saxe received the

Cognitive Neuroscience SocietyYoung Investigator Award

acknowledging contributionsthat she has made to the

eld o social cognitiveneuroscience. She was also

awarded the 2008 PackardFoundation Fellowship.

Sebastian Seung was

awarded the 2008 Ho-AmPrize in Engineering, a special

award o the Samsung WelareFoundation presented to ethnic

Koreans who have achieved

world-class standards in

creative research.

Li-Huei Tsai was elected into

the Academia Sinica o theRepublic o China.

The BCS Fall 2007 Award or

Excellence in UndergraduateAdvising was presented to

Pawan Sinha.

Josh Tenenbaum wasselected as a recipient o the2008 American Psychological

Association (APA) DistinguishedScientic Award or Early Career

Contribution to Psychology inthe area o cognition and human

learning. Josh and his lab wererecognized with two additional

awards in computationalmodeling in 2007 or Best Paper

on Perception and Action aswell as Best Paper on Higher-

Level Cognition.

StaRutledge Ellis-Behnke was

eatured as one o eight nano-experts in an article titled

Ophthalmology on theNanorontier in the November

issue o the American Academyo Ophthalmologys publication,

EyeNet magazine.

Postdoctoral Fellow Daniel

Bendor received a Helen Hay

Whitney Fellowship.

Postdoctoral Fellow Evelina

Fedorenko will be getting aK99 award rom the NIH.

Postdoctoral Fellow SridevaSarma won a Burrough-Wellcome Fund CASI award.

StudentsFour BCS undergrads wereselected as 2008 Burchard

Scholars: juniors StephanieChan and Matthew Serna, and

sophomores Matthew Cohenand Niyatec Samudra.

Angus MacDonald Awards orExcellence in UndergraduateTeaching went to Graduate

Students Paymon Hosseini,Jim Mutch, Li-Wei (Livia) King,

Talia Konkle, Michael Frankand Chris Baker or their Fall

07 eorts, and to Ul Knoblich,

Michelle Machon, and SrinivasTuraga or the Spring 2007term. For the Spring 08 terms,

these awards went to: Ul

Knoblich, Michelle Machon,

Srinivas Turaga, PaymonHosseini, James Mutch, Li-Wei (Livia) King, Christopher

L. Baker, Talia Konkle, and

Michael Frank.

The Walle Nauta Award orContinuing Dedication to

Teaching was given toAmy

Perors or Spring 2007 and

Spring 2008.

The Walle Nauta Award or

Outstanding Research in Brain

& Cognitive Sciences waspresented toAdina Fischer08, Lizabeth Jordan 08,

Suejean Lim 08, and Michael

Obilade 08.

Honorable Mention or

Outstanding Academic Recordwent to the ollowing class

o 2009 students: Sha-har

Adomni, Alice Ainsworth,

Stephanie Brenman, Tharian

Cherian, Abigail Clark,

Jaquelyn Gold, LaurenHabenicht, Denise Ichino,

Gloria Lee, Christopher

Moses, Navine Nasser-

Ghodsi, Kimberly Reinhold,

Matthew Serna, Irina Shklyar,

Jordan Sorensen, Adita

Joshi,and ManJae Kwon.

It is with deep sadness that we note the untimely passingo senior Robert M. Wells on March 1, 2008. Robert was avibrant and engaged member o the BCS community and hewill be missed by all and, most especially, by his classmates.

In Memoriam

p.08


9/12

The BCS Cruise

Five years o BCS graduate students: Chris Baker (04

entering class), Scott Gorlin (05), Caroline Runyan (06),

Yarden Katz (07), John McCoy (08)

As always, cruisers enjoyed

great weather

beautiul views o downtown Boston

and a ascinating talk by

Emery Brown.

good times

Honorable Mention orOutstanding Research is given

to sophomores and juniors orexceptional research activities

within the department. Thisyears awards went to juniors

Tharian Cherian, Danbee

Kim, and Denise Ichino, and

to sophomoresAinsley Braunand Isabel Chang.

The Han-Lukas Teuber Awardor Outstanding Academic

Achievement at MIT went toseniors Zainab Azeez,AdinaFischer, Irene Headen, Kaitlin

Kamrowski, Peter Lai, NuneLemaire, Tao Liu, Jamie

Mehringer, Narine Mousissian,

Caroline Rubin,Mariam

Shaikh, Tess Veuthy,AngelineWang, and Rany Woo.

Irene Headen received theAlbert G. Hill Prize.

Tau Liu, Nune Martirosyan,

Jamie Mehringer, Caroline

Rubin, and Mariam Shaikh

were all named to Phi BetaKappa. Caroline also won the

Louis Kamp Writing Prize inWomens and Gender Studies.

BCS graduating seniors Tao Liu

and Tess Veuthey were namedFulbright Scholars.



10/12

I you ever wished Hollywood would

take more o an interest in brain sciencewhen concocting plots or their summer

blockbusters, you might want to team upwith one o these rst-year grad students

and submit an idea. In an eort to getto know the incoming group, students

were asked to come up with a workingtitle, summary, casting possibilities and

opportunities or explosions or otherdramatic eects or a high-budget summer

blockbuster.

Matthew DobbinWorking title:Mutant Brains rom Planet XSummary: In the near uture, contact with

an alien race o levitating brain creatures is

established. Although they appear to be riendly, a

brilliant neuroscientist uncovers their plan to control

the U.S.A. through a pop-music group. This brain

scientist must use his knowledge o the brain along

with his karate skills to save the country.

Cast:Brad Pitt will play the role o the

neuroscientist and Angelina Jolie will play his

love interest.

Explosions?Explosions will be used wheneverpossible.

Charles FrognerWorking title:There Will Be Dorsolateral LesionsSummary:A young graduate student breezes

past the competition in graduate school, achieving

several stunning discoveries and attaining his Ph.D.

within three years. Along the way he romances

a beautiul starlet whose lie he saves during a

shootout with the mob.

Cast:I always thought Hugh Grant and Julia

Roberts should do a movie together.

Explosions?One o the heros scientic

discoveries will be made when he must deuse a

bomb that is wired to depend on the unction ocertain circuits in visual cortex. There will also be

big explosions.

Rodrigo GarciaWorking title: The Memetic Wars Episode XXI

Summary:Humankind nds itsel at the mercy

o Memeto ater he steals government plans or the

rst ever direct neural interace device, iBrain. Now

a team o top secret Marine Philosophers and Navy

Comp Scientists must nd a way to stop Memeto

beore he enslaves all o humanity, orcing everyone

to watch nonstop reality shows.

Cast:Ricky Gervais plays the role o the Navy

Commander and Audrey Tautou plays Memetos

mischievous sidekick.

Explosions?All major action scenes takeplace in a cyber battleeld, where, rom their Elite

Armchair units, the Marine scientists ace o with

Memetos Henchmen.

Azriel GhadooshahyWorking title:AugmentationSummary:A prominent young scientist at MIT

develops neurotechnology that greatly enhances

human cognitive abilities allowing or telekinesis. He

tests the new technology on himsel, and soon things

start blowing up and the military gets involved.

Cast:The brain scientist is played by Jake

Gyllenhaal, and the love interest by GwynethPaltrow.

Explosions?Its easy in this story. Jake

Gyllenhaal becomes warped by his own technology

and his lover, Gwyneth Paltrow, holds the key to

stopping him on his path to destruction. He blows a

lot o stu up beore he is ultimately stopped. Other

special eects include levitation, time warps and a

psychedelic sequence when the scientist rst uses

the neurotechnology on himsel.

Emily KoWorking title:Scary Movie nSummary:Typical mad scientist wreaks

psychological havoc when the President o the

United States appoints him Surgeon General

where he is in a position to eect population-wide,

targeted norepinephrine inusions, enabling him to

spark national panics over whatever. Hold on to your

basolateral amygdalae!

Cast:The RockExplosions?Not so many as this is a Scary

Movie. However, do look or a cameo by the

fashbacking ghost o Phineas Gage.

Joel LeiboWorking title:The Man Who Knew Too Much

Summary:A new movie take on the Faustlegend. A man makes a bargain with an insidious

neuroscientist to implant the sum o all human

knowledge into his brain. All goes well until his head

swells to enormous size and he is shunned by the

rest o human society.

Cast:The brain scientist would be played by

Jeremy Irons. The main (Faust) character would be

played by Matt Damon (he already has kind o a big

head) and his (unrequited) love interest would be

the girl rom Nickelodeons show Alex Mack (the one

who turns into a puddle o goo).

Explosions?There are no explosions as this isa sad movie. There will however be a really trippy

dream sequence in the scene where the knowledge

is implanted into his brain.

Nun LemaireWorking title:The ConditionedSummary:It is 2015. The British governmentestablishes a secret neuroscience institute to

nd a psychological approach to improving the

economy ollowing the 2008 crash. They come up

with a euphoria-inducing gas, and nd that it has

a special property o creating one-trial positive

pavlovian conditioning. A disgruntled and greedy

scientist sells the still-secret recipe to struggling

toy giant Ty, makers o Beanie Babies. Ty starts an

advertising campaign in movie theatres where the

gas is released during commercials, producing an

out o control Beanie Baby craze. In the ensuingchaos, one brave neuroscience graduate student

tries to save his girlriend and the rest o the world

by inventing an antidote.

Laura LewisWorking title:Corr Techs

Summary: Crime-ghting neuroscientist Corr

Techs saves the world. Also, his lengthy expositions

on the brain enlighten the audience.

Cast:The brain scientist is Robert Downey Jr.,who has scientist/superhero experience rom Iron

Man. The love interest is Christina Ricci due to her

unusually large head.

Explosions?Big explosions are involved whenour hero gets really angry. He explodes buildings

with the sheer power o his brain knowledge.

Joshua ManningWorking title:Silence o the Glands:Hannibals

Massacre Without Fear

Summary:This sequel to Silence o the Lambs

picks up just ater Hannibal Lecter discovers his

enjoyment o easting on Ray Liottas cortex as way

to murder him. He soon discovers the eectiveness

o using his gourmet skills with the hypothalamus

which removes a key part o the HPA axis, allowing

him to eliminate the physical response to ear,which in turn silences the glands, making his

murder spree less dicult in his old age while

satisying his unending need or the study o neural

anatomy and behavior.

Cast:Anthony Hopkins, o course.Explosions? The explosions will take place when

agent Starling tries to catch Dr. Lecter or the ourth

time. O course, Dr. Lecters body is never ound.

John McCoyWorking title:Its All in Your HeadSummary:A neuroscientist regains

consciousness ater being a subject in a colleagues

routine experiment. Shes hearing voices in her

head, her colleague has disappeared, and the

First Year Graduate Students Aspire to

Hollywood Greatness

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monkeys in the lab are acting strangely. Nobodys

taking her seriously, but someone dangerous is ater

her hippocampus...

Cast:At the casting directors discretion.

Explosions?Gratuitous explosions are alwaysgood, especially with bits o fying cortex. You could

also produce some serious visual mayhem with a

bunch o MRI machines and lots o jagged metal.

Tatsuo OkuboWorking title:A Memory Potion

Summary:Trying to help his amnesic girlriend,a neuroscientist makes a single dose o drug to

boost memory. That inormation leaks somehow

and he has to go through numerous battles to

deend the drug rom many others craving it. He

manages to deend it in the end, but suddenly

throws it away declaring that he loves his girlriend

as she is.

Cast:The brain scientist will be played by RobertDe Niro, the love interest by Nicole Kidman.

Explosions?No explosions. Its a romance.

Christopher SaenzWorking title:Devilution

Summary:An epically bad B-Movie about an

over-the-top mad scientist hell-bent on massmind control. The physicist hero who tries to stop

him realizes too late that the mad scientist is his

ather and, instead, joins him in his quest or global

domination.

Cast: The role o brain scientist is played by

Gary Oldman and the love interest by Helena

Bonham Carter.

Explosions?The big explosions will be lowbudget CGI and o the shel sparklers. Think Big

Trouble in Little China meets your average Sunday

aternoon SciFi Channel movie.

Josh SiegleWorking title:Neural Justice League!Summary:Watch as distinguished neuroscientists

use their unique superpowers to deend explanations

o brain unction rom the evil Homunculi.

Cast:Starring a mustachioed Kal Penn asVilayanur Phantom Limb Ramachandran, a

bearded Bill Murray as Roger Brain Splitter Sperry,

and a clean-shaven William H. Macy as Bert Patch

Clamper Sakmann, not to mention an unorgettable

perormance by Larry David as Eric Watch Out For

My Bow Tie Kandel.

Explosions?Prepare to be awed as the Leagueghts an explosive battle or ocular domination on

the Receptive Mineeld.

Melissa TroyerWorking title:The Little Neuron Who CouldSummary: In Disney-Pixars controversial new

lm, little Dopie the dopaminergic neuron learns a

hard lesson when his human goes out or a night

on the town. Will Dopies human ever learn to

control her drinking habits, or is Dopie in or a lie o

mistrust and abuse?

Cast: The voice o Dopie is played by Bruce Willis,

and his love interest, the ever-inhibitory Gabbie,

who unknowingly thwarts some o Dopies greatest

dreams, is played by Megan Mullally.

Explosions? In the most talked-about scene o

the year, Dopie and Gabbie conduct action potentialsin exuberantly explosive spikes. The results are too

exciting to mention here . . .

Tomer UllmanWorking title:Gray MatterSummary:Brilliant Pro. Julian Gray invents

prosthetic brain-enhancements that give him

incredible abilities. He is then chased by the

government because they are Evil, but Pro. Gray is

Good, and he will WIN.

Cast: Gray is played by Bruce Willis wearing

glasses, because glasses are Hollywoods Tenure

Track. The love interest will be an intelligent robot

that Gray invented. It will be animated by CGI and

will look exactly like Uma Thurman.

Explosions?The whole movie starts with adream sequence o Grays lab exploding. Later,

Grays lab EXPLODES FOR REAL. The rest o the

movie is basically a series o explosions that Gray

narrowly escapes using his enhanced intelligence,

until at last he blows up the Government using his

prosthetics, thereby losing them.

Jakob VoigtsWorking title: Paper

Summary:Via some arbitrary plot device a

disgruntled, jobless architect has to come up with

a ridiculous sum o money and turns to raudulent

research unding ater nding an abandoned copy o

Nature in a bus.

Cast:Helena Bonham Carter would play the brainscientist, and John Cusack the love interest.

Explosions?There will be a grand wag thedog-like scene o masterul photoshoppery and

data abrication as well as oodles o colorul

pseudoscience. Also, there will be a gratuitous the

usual suspects moment!

Sangyu XuWorking title: Mental State

Summary:A conservative Senator and

presidential candidate takes part in a celebrityreality show Are You Blue or Red? hosted by a

cognitive scientist. While the Senator is in the MRI

a malunction alters his brain states releasing quite

a bit o inhibition. As a result he becomes unny

and liberal and he wins the election in a landslide.

Eventually he quits his job because he cannot

ocus on serious matters and becomes a liberal

talk show host.

Cast:Jim Carrey is the Senator, and Kate Winslet

the cognitive scientist.

Explosions?It is unavoidable that various evil

powers rom gangs to corporations go ater our

heros resulting in big explosions, high speed car

chases and romance.

rom l to r: Azriel

Ghadooshahy (back),

Christopher Saenz,

Matthew Dobbin, Josh

Manning (ront), Joel

Leibo (back), Melissa

Troyer, Charles Frogner,

John McCoy (back), Josh

Siegle, Tomer Ullman

(back), Emily Ko, Rodrigo

Garcia (middle), Laura

Lewis (back), Sangyu

Xu, Jakob Voigts, Tatsuo

Okubo. Not pictured:Nun Lemaire.



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postdocs representing the breadth o the Department and itsinterests. In this system, enthusiasm and team spirit trump other

considerations and all players, regardless o experience or ability,play every game. The Straw Dogs embody the whole team

concept, says Jason Cromer. Even with a team roster o 18,

everyone is happy to share playing time. Rotating the players

equally sometimes poses a challenge, especially when playingagainst teams who may not do the same. Anyone can stu ateam with jocks and win a championship, says Chris Moore. We

won without compromising on our core principals which value un,community, and equality above all else.

Men and women, aculty, sta, grad students, lab managers,postdocs rom McGovern, Picower as well as BCS play on the

team. There is a range o abilities as wellsome players haveplayed since high school, and others are learning or the rst time.

Next year, the Straw Dogs may be moving into a higher-levelleague. Jason Cromer hopes to preserve the teams philosophy

while remaining competitive when aced with the greaterchallenge. The level o competition will be more stressul, he

says, but it will be interesting. He is looking orward to seeingeveryone on the team again next season.

The Straw Dogs players

students, aculty, sta and

postdocsrepresent the breadth

o BCS and its interests

continued rom p.05

top: power-hitting machine

Reuben Goodman

right: the Cromer

amilya two-headed

sotball monster

brain+cognitive sciences

Massachusetts Institute o Technology77 Massachusetts AveCambridge MA 02139

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bcs newsletter - fall 2008

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