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What is the Canadian Computational Neuroscience Spotlight (CCNS)?

The Canadian Computational Neuroscience Spotlight (CCNS) was created following the mass cancellations and postponements of traditional neuroscience conferences during the early stages of the COVID-19 pandemic, including two such meetings amongst the Canadian neuroscience community. The absence of these meetings presented an opportunity to create a brand-new, entirely virtual academic meeting that could take full advantage of the online setting. Given that traditionally-defined trainees and early-career researchers were arguably most impacted by the cancellation of the networking and learning opportunities that conferences present, CCNS was designed as a “trainee-focused” meeting, highlighted by tutorial talks beginning each session, panel discussions with both established and early-career scientists, and a spotlight on trainee presentations.

The first edition of CCNS was planned and implemented entirely in ten weeks and yielded a meeting with more than 450 registrants, including representation from every continent across the globe. Perhaps most importantly, the limited costs of the virtual setting allowed the meeting to be completely free of charge for all attendees. Every element of the meeting remains available for replay online, another benefit of the virtual setting. This success served as the impetus for making CCNS a recurring academic meeting.

Going forward, CCNS will continue to highlight cutting-edge computational neuroscience research, both in Canada and around the world, while providing unique learning, networking, and presentation opportunities for early-career researchers. The meeting is committed to remaining cost-accessible to the entire academic community, using the virtual setting to maximize accessibility for populations for which physical conferences present a challenge, and maintaining a diverse lineup of speakers during its continued evolution.

The theme for "CCNSv2" is Bridging the Spatial Scales of Computational Neuroscience. Each of our four sessions will highlight research at a different scale of neuroscientific investigation, with a focus on how the insights from one scale can be translated to other lines of inquiry. In a change from last year, each session will be organized by a session chair outside of the organizing committee, ensuring CCNS will continue to capture the wide range of fascinating research falling under the broad banner of computational neuroscience.

CCNS will remain a "trainee focused" meeting, highlighted by tutorial talks beginning each session. These talks will introduce a vital topic or tool that will be of import in the following research talks to the broad CCNS audience.  Panel discussions will also return, one including experienced researchers and another with traditionally-defined early-career researchers, in order to provide both perspectives to our audience of trainees.

Who are the session chairs, and who is speaking?

While the scheduling is still on-going, we are happy to announce three confirmed session chairs: Dr. Etay Hay of the Krembil Centre for Neuroinformatics, Dr. Maurizio de Pitta of the Basque Center for Applied Mathematics, Dr. Carmen Canvier of Louisiana State University, and Dr. Bratislav Misic of McGill University.

The list of speakers is now finalized! Please see the session list for the meeting's program, and go to ccnsmeeting.ca for further details on our speakers.

I want to give a trainee talk! What should I do?

We invite trainees to submit abstracts for talks covering any subject falling under the broad banner of computational neuroscience. To do so, fill out this Google Form.  We anticipate all submissions will be accepted unless the demand far exceeds our expectations. Talks will either be 8 minutes (with 2 minutes for questions) or 12 minutes (with 3 minutes for questions) depending on the demand. Four submissions that are both the most meritorious and best correspond with the themes of our sessions will be offered a longer, "spotlight" presentation.

Wait, do I have to be Canadian to attend?

This meeting was first designed as a “Canadian” spotlight event considering the COVID-19 related cancellations or postponements of many neuroscience meetings in our country. However, the meeting quickly grew to not only include an international group of speakers, but also attendees from across the globe. As such, while we endeavor to shine a spotlight on the burgeoning computational neuroscience community within Canada, this meeting is designed for an international audience, and everyone is encouraged to register.

We are excited to see you at the second Canadian Computational Neuroscience Spotlight!

Scott Rich, Ph.D. Postdoctoral Research Fellow, Krembil Research Institute.

Andreea Diaconescu, Ph.D. Independent Scientist, Krembil Center for Neuroinformatics at CAMH.

John Griffiths, Ph.D. Independent Scientist, Krembil Center for Neuroinformatics at CAMH.

Milad Lankarany, Ph.D. Scientist, Krembil Research Institute.

Canadian Computational Neuroscience Spotlight

Canadian Computational Neuroscience Spotlight v2

Research Talk: Modelling network communication in the human connectome, Dr. Caio Seguin

Research Talk:  Psychadelics flatten the brain's energy landscape, Dr. Amy Kuceyeski

Trainee Spotlight: Giulia Baracchini and Heng Kang Yao

Tutorial Talk: Optimizing detailed models of human neurons with bluePyOpt, Dr. Alexandre Guet-McCreight

Research Talk, Effects of reduced inhibition in depression on simulated cortical processing and EEG signals, Dr. Etay Hay

Research Talk: Theory and model-based inference of short-term plasticity, Dr. Richard Naud