Presented under the auspices of the DIMACS/BioMaPS/MB Center Special Focus on Information Processing in Biology.
This special focus is jointly sponsored by the Center for Discrete Mathematics and Theoretical Computer Science (DIMACS), the Biological, Mathematical, and Physical Sciences Interfaces Institute for Quantitative Biology (BioMaPS), and the Rutgers Center for Molecular Biophysics and Biophysical Chemistry (MB Center).
Conference on Data Mining, Systems Analysis and Optimization in Neuroscience
The human brain is among the most complex systems known to mankind. Neuroscientists seek to understand brain function through detailed analysis of neuronal excitability and synaptic transmission. Only in the last few years has it become feasible to capture simultaneous responses from large enough numbers of neurons to empirically test the theories of human brain function. Experimental neuroscience methods have resulted in massive amounts of data, but traditional data-processing and quantitative methods are not sophisticated enough to exploit this new flood of information. There is an increasing number of modern research efforts in data mining, systems analysis and optimization research to advance methods needed to process the large spatial and temporal data arising in quantitative neuroscience. The purpose of this conference is to explore these new methods.
A major area of interest lies in the study of how neuronal circuitries of the brain support its cognitive and functioning capacities at a descriptive level of the molecular mechanisms of synaptic plasticity. Advances in the fields of signal processing, statistics, data mining and optimization have made it possible to discover and investigate complex patterns in the vast amount of information being generated by neuroimaging and neurophysiological signals. Research breakthroughs could lead to understanding more about diseases such as epilepsy, sleep disorders, movement disorders, and cognitive disorders that affect millions of people every year.
This conference will bring together a multi-disciplinary group to enable the sharing of knowledge, ideas, and techniques. This requires, by necessity, collaboration among computer scientists, mathematicians, neurobiologists and clinicians. This conference will result in lively discussions of the cross-disciplinary research and open up a new question: How do we go from the gigabytes of experimental data that we now have to concise conclusions about the function of the brain? The answer to this question will revolutionize neuroscience research and give us a greater understanding of brain function.
Papers presented at the conference will be considered for publication in special issues of international journals.
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