[TNJC] Neuro Journal Club next week (8/4, 2pm, Tuesday)

[Ben Dongsung Huh]

Dear all, 

Please note that TNJC is moving back to Tuesday 2pm schedule.
For this week's TNJC, Kristin Voelk will present the following paper.

Title:  Temporal structure of motor variability is dynamically regulated and predicts motor learning ability

by Howard G Wu, Yohsuke R Miyamoto, Luis Nicolas Gonzalez Castro, Bence P Ölveczky & Maurice A Smith

http://www.nature.com/neuro/journal/v17/n2/full/nn.3616.html

Abstract:
Individual differences in motor learning ability are widely acknowledged, yet little is known about the factors that underlie them. Here we explore whether movement-to-movement variability in motor output, a ubiquitous if often unwanted characteristic of motor performance, predicts motor learning ability. Surprisingly, we found that higher levels of task-relevant motor variability predicted faster learning both across individuals and across tasks in two different paradigms, one relying on reward-based learning to shape specific arm movement trajectories and the other relying on error-based learning to adapt movements in novel physical environments. We proceeded to show that training can reshape the temporal structure of motor variability, aligning it with the trained task to improve learning. These results provide experimental support for the importance of action exploration, a key idea from reinforcement learning theory, showing that motor variability facilitates motor learning in humans and that our nervous systems actively regulate it to improve learning.

See you then!

Next presenter list:

Carsen	4/15/2014
Easter Week	4/22/2014
PeterL	4/29/2014
Gergo	5/6/2014

coming soon: Joana, Tom, Federico, Mehdi, Kyo

Ben Dongsung Huh
Gatsby Computational Neuroscience Unit