Alex Barnett
assistant prof at McGill / memory / fMRI / epilepsy / opinions are my brain's / he / him
- Reposted by Alex BarnettHow does superficial white matter contribute to large-scale #brain function? @borismontreal.bsky.social &co use an approach based on 3D histology & 7-Tesla MRI to reveal associations between superficial #WhiteMatter microstructure & diverse cortical properties @plosbiology.org 🧪 plos.io/460WNIz
- Reposted by Alex BarnettThe extended version of my thesis procrastination project/subcortex visualization package is out now in both Python and R, now that I’ve graduated 🤠 This figure shows the 9 atlases included (and counting)! Preprint: www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6... Website: anniegbryant.github.io/subcortex_vi...
- Reposted by Alex BarnettWho has shaped how we understand the human mind? Nominations for the David E. Rumelhart Prize are open through Feb 23, 2026 🗓️ Visit cognitivesciencesociety.org/rumelhart-pr... to learn about past recipients and submit a nomination!
- Reposted by Alex BarnettNew paper in Imaging Neuroscience by Nichole R. Bouffard, Mary Pat McAndrews, et al: Single voxel autocorrelation reflects hippocampal function in temporal lobe epilepsy doi.org/10.1162/IMAG...
- Reposted by Alex BarnettOver the years, I have written a few Jupyter/Rmd/Matlab notebooks that attempt to teach some statistical concepts, particularly in neuroimaging. You can find them here: www.mrc-cbu.cam.ac.uk/people/rik.h..., though I will say a bit more about each one in a number of posts over next few days.
- Reposted by Alex BarnettOpportunity to move to Canada. 🍁 The Lifespan Institute @brocku.ca is looking to hire a Canada Excellence Research Chair In Healthy Development Across the Lifespan. More info in the job ad (salary negotiable). brocku.wd3.myworkdayjobs.com/brocku_caree....
- Reposted by Alex BarnettNew Preprint 🚨 This research with @alexbarnett.bsky.social, Yulia Lamekina, @barense.bsky.social, and @bjherrmann.bsky.social examines how background noise shapes event segmentation during continuous speech listening and its consequences for memory. osf.io/e67qr_v1 @auditoryaging.bsky.social
- Reposted by Alex BarnettMy lab is recruiting a postdoc and a full-time research technician to work on an NIH-funded project studying age-related changes in memory for naturalistic events. Behavior, fMRI, and blood-based biomarkers. 3+ years funding guaranteed. Postdoc: tinyurl.com/ykjfbnj8 Tech: tinyurl.com/2f2hw3f5
- Reposted by Alex Barnett🧠 Hiring a Research Assistant/Lab Manager! Share widely! 📍 St. Louis | ⏰ Full-time We're launching the How We Learn Lab @WashU, studying attention, learning & memory interactions. Perfect for anyone interested in dev cog neuro who wants hands-on experience before grad school. deckerlab.com
- Reposted by Alex BarnettFinally out: www.eneuro.org/content/earl... fMRI during naturalistic story listening in noise, looking at event-segmentation and ISC signatures. Listeners stay engaged and comprehend the gist even in moderate noise. with @ayshamota.bsky.social @ryanaperry.bsky.social @ingridjohnsrude.bsky.social
- Reposted by Alex BarnettOur new paper in @sfnjournals.bsky.social shows different neural systems for integrating views into places--PPA integrates views *of* a location (e.g., views of a landmark), while RSC integrates views *from* a location (e.g., views of a panorama). Work by the bluesky-less Linfeng Tony Han.
- #JNeurosci: Using fMRI, Han and Epstein explored how people integrate different kinds of views to form mental maps of places, revealing two sets of brain regions involved in integrating views of landmarks into existing mental maps of a virtual city. doi.org/10.1523/JNEUROSCI.0…
- Reposted by Alex BarnettWith some trepidation, I'm putting this out into the world: gershmanlab.com/textbook.html It's a textbook called Computational Foundations of Cognitive Neuroscience, which I wrote for my class. My hope is that this will be a living document, continuously improved as I get feedback.
- Reposted by Alex BarnettExcited to be teaching a new undergraduate course on Models of Language and Conversation this term! Check it out here: context-lab.com/llm-course/ I've added lots of fun interactive demos of chatbots and NLP techniques that let students dig into the approaches.
- Reposted by Alex BarnettNew preprint on how working memory (WM) supports event segmentation. Using load-sensitive EEG markers, we test whether WM accumulates information within events or instead reactivates prior event information at boundaries. osf.io/preprints/ps...
- New preprint alert! 📢 Event segmentation allows us to parse continuous experience into meaningful events. Working memory (WM) is suggested to play a key role in this process, but how? osf.io/preprints/ps...
- Reposted by Alex BarnettWhat if we could tell you how well you’ll remember your next visit to your local coffee shop? ☕️ In our new Nature Human Behaviour paper, we show that the 𝗾𝘂𝗮𝗹𝗶𝘁𝘆 𝗼𝗳 𝗮 𝘀𝗽𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗮𝗹 𝗿𝗲𝗽𝗿𝗲𝘀𝗲𝗻𝘁𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻 can be measured with neuroimaging – and 𝘁𝗵𝗮𝘁 𝘀𝗰𝗼𝗿𝗲 𝗽𝗿𝗲𝗱𝗶𝗰𝘁𝘀 𝗵𝗼𝘄 𝘄𝗲𝗹𝗹 𝗻𝗲𝘄 𝗲𝘅𝗽𝗲𝗿𝗶𝗲𝗻𝗰𝗲𝘀 𝘄𝗶𝗹𝗹 𝘀𝘁𝗶𝗰𝗸.
- New study by @xrmasiso.bsky.social et al shows that spatial contexts with more reliable brain representations better support memory for future experiences within them, revealing how stable neural maps help the brain organize and recall life events.
- Reposted by Alex BarnettVery happy to see this last thesis paper in press @natcomms.nature.com! We combine intracranial EEG with multimodal MRI to study how interregional similarity in neurophysiology relates to different network scales ⚡ 🧠 Full story 👇 www.nature.com/articles/s41...
- Reposted by Alex BarnettExcited to share the publication of our work which explores the application of LLMs in event segmentation and memory research. For researchers interested in applying these validated methods, an open-source module is available on GitHub (github.com/ryanapanela/EventRecall).
- Large language models automate event segmentation & recall scoring with human-level accuracy. LLMs identify event boundaries more consistently than humans, while semantic embeddings enable scalable memory assessments. @ryanapanela.bsky.social @bjherrmann.bsky.social www.nature.com/articles/s44...
- Reposted by Alex BarnettLarge language models automate event segmentation & recall scoring with human-level accuracy. LLMs identify event boundaries more consistently than humans, while semantic embeddings enable scalable memory assessments. @ryanapanela.bsky.social @bjherrmann.bsky.social www.nature.com/articles/s44...
- Reposted by Alex BarnettThe last chapter of my PhD (expanded) is finally out as a preprint! “Semantic reasoning takes place largely outside the language network” 🧠🧐 www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6... What is semantic reasoning? Read on! 🧵👇
- Reposted by Alex BarnettWe are hiring an assistant professor in cognitive neural systems in the department of psychology at the university of arizona. please use this link to check out the requirements and apply! arizona.csod.com/ux/ats/caree...
- Reposted by Alex BarnettI'm happy to share my debut as first-author with the recent publication of our article in #JNeurosci: www.jneurosci.org/content/earl... Big thanks again to @tschreiner.bsky.social and the whole team who made this possible! 🧠🌬️
- Very excited to share the first preprint of my PhD thesis! Together with @tschreiner.bsky.social, we investigated how respiration coordinates signature neural expressions of successful remembering during memory retrieval. 🫁🧠 🧵(1/8)
- Reposted by Alex BarnettWhat makes visual stimuli memorable? Wilma Bainbridge, @keisukefukuda.bsky.social, Lore Goetschalckx, and I investigate the role of processing fluency for memorability in a new review paper in Nature Reviews Psychology. Check it out! rdcu.be/eSyjz
- Reposted by Alex BarnettWe're thrilled to announce the publication of our newest paper in @plosone.org 🎉 "Aging and episodic memory specificity: Evidence challenging a domain-general pattern separation decline" Read Dr. Youm's full paper here: doi.org/10.1371/jour... @melaniecohn.bsky.social #Memory #Psychology #Aging
- Reposted by Alex BarnettAligning eye tracking and free recall time series, we found that increased saccades predict episodic (vs. non-episodic) by 0.5 s. Just out in @cognitionjournal.bsky.social, led by Ryan Barker with the inimitable @drjenryan.bsky.social. www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...
- Reposted by Alex BarnettNew pontification piece with @awestbrook.bsky.social and Jean Daunizeau, just out in TICS: Why is cognitive effort experienced as costly? (or why does it hurt to think) never written a review paper before in my life, that was a new and unusual experience
- Reposted by Alex BarnettI wrote a thing on episodic memory and systems consolidation. I hope you all enjoy it and/or find it interesting. A neural state space for episodic memories www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti... #neuroskyence #psychscisky #cognition 🧪
- Reposted by Alex BarnettOur experience of time is powerfully shaped by boundaries between events (i.e., going from one meeting to the next). But what about time *within an event*? In new work, we find reliable distortions of time based on internal event structure (e.g., beginnings, middles, and ends)! tinyurl.com/n8mn2sn7
- Reposted by Alex Barnett🆕 New open neuroimaging dataset released! I’m happy to share that our Naturalistic Neuroimaging Database (NNDb3T+) is now publicly available! NNDb3T+ captures rich, multimodal brain activity in a naturalistic setting with 40 participants and over 160 hours of scanning!
- Reposted by Alex BarnettNew preprint ↙️ Using 2 independent 7T fMRI datasets (HCP & our PNI dataset 🧲 💅 ), we found that intersubject synchronization 👯 during movies aligns closely with cortical gradients 🌈, especially along the visual-to-transmodal axis by Meaghan Smith & a terrific team ↙️ doi.org/10.1101/2025...
- Reposted by Alex Barnettthrilled to share our preprint on false memories in naturalistic recollection! Distinct paths to false memory revealed in hundreds of narrative recalls paper: doi.org/10.31234/osf... w/ phoebehc.bsky.social (co-first) Vy A. Vo @davidpoeppel.bsky.social @toddgureckis.bsky.social thread below 👇
- Reposted by Alex BarnettWhy I left academia and neuroscience. This post on Substack has gained a lot of traction. I think many people identify with it. (Most of my posts are technical tutorials on machine-learning and LLM-mechanisms.) mikexcohen.substack.com/p/why-i-left...
- Reposted by Alex BarnettThe brain represents the world around us as a series of neural states - stable patterns of activity that change as we move from one event to the next. New paper by @selmalugtmeijer.bsky.social showing that neural states get longer as people age. #PsychSciSky nature.com/articles/s42003-025-08792-4
- Reposted by Alex Barnett🚨 New paper in Nature Methods: HippoMaps: multiscale cartography of the human hippocampus Open-source tools & data to explore structure and function of the 🍤🧠 (histology, in/ex vivo MRI, iEEG) Led by @jordandekraker.bsky.social docs: hippomaps.readthedocs.io paper: doi.org/10.1038/s415...
- Reposted by Alex BarnettExcited to share that I'm joining WashU in January as an Assistant Prof in Psych & Brain Sciences! 🧠✨! I'm also recruiting grad students to start next September - come hang out with us! Details about our lab here: www.deckerlab.com Reposts are very welcome! 🙌 Please help spread the word!
- Reposted by Alex BarnettThe MAC lab at Drexel is looking for a new post-doc to work on NIH-funded projects investigating the intersection of prior knowledge and long-term memory consolidation. Please pass along to any interested lab members! careers.drexel.edu/cw/en-us/job...
- Reposted by Alex BarnettCome join us at University of Toronto. We're hiring a Professor of computational cognitive neuroscience. #neuroAI #compneuro jobs.utoronto.ca/job/Toronto-...
- Reposted by Alex BarnettOur lab auditoryaging.com at the Rotman Research Institute at Baycrest in Toronto is recruiting a graduate student for Fall 2026. We work on cognition, hearing, hearing loss, and social consequences of hearing loss. Get in-touch (email). For UofT admission details www.sgs.utoronto.ca/programs/psy...
- New preprint! My stellar undergrad, June Kim, & @charan-neuro.bsky.social find that intersubject pattern similarity at encoding (especially in posteromedial cortex) relates to shared/differing content between Ss at recall (measured using topic modeling) www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...
- Reposted by Alex BarnettHow might stories shed light on brain function? Check out this opinion piece by @alexbarnett.bsky.social and I about the DMN and "situation models" -- our understanding of the current "state of affairs" in a story (or even experience). www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...
- Reposted by Alex Barnett1/ 🚨 Preprint alert! How does the brain make sense of continuous experience? We find that continuous experiences can be compressed using a subset of key moments that dominate comprehension and recall. 👉 doi.org/10.1101/2025.08.30.…
- Reposted by Alex BarnettNeed to control visual similarity in your experiments? A new open database by Robbins and colleagues @michaelhout.bsky.social @haywardgodwin.bsky.social, published in #psynomBRM, maps similarity among 1,200 objects in 20 categories using MDS—validated & ready to use.
- Reposted by Alex BarnettQuantifying memory recall is hard! Luckily, natural language processing (incl. #LLMs) offers new, automated, and scalable ways to do that! Great new review by Fenerci & @signysheldon.bsky.social in @cp-trendscognsci.bsky.social! www.cell.com/trends/cogni...
- Reposted by Alex BarnettExcited to share our new paper w/ @cibaker.bsky.social in @natcomms.nature.com linking active vision & memory! We provide evidence that gaze reinstatement & neural reactivation are deeply related phenomena that jointly reflect the experiences constructed during recall. doi.org/10.1038/s414... 🧵1/9
- Reposted by Alex BarnettNo one ever steps in the same movie twice. Anticipatory gaze 👁️ indicate episodic memory seconds before an event occurs. 🧠🐾 Very robust effects across both natural and crafted movies, and of course, after sleep! 😴. Out today in Communication Psychology: www.nature.com/articles/s44... Check it out!
- Reposted by Alex BarnettNew CNeuroMod-THINGS open-access fMRI dataset: 4 participants · ~4 000 images (720 categories) each shown 3× (12k trials per subject)· individual functional localizers & NSD-inspired QC . Preprint: arxiv.org/abs/2507.09024 Congrats Marie St-Laurent and @martinhebart.bsky.social !!
- Reposted by Alex Barnett📢 job opening: software developer at Mila Quebec AI Institute & McGill As of now, my team is looking to hire a new technical staff member with abackground in a STEM area for running and curating existing AI analysis pipelines, as well as designing GUIs around them. Please DM or email me, with CV
- Reposted by Alex BarnettMy first, first author paper, comparing the properties of memory-augmented large language models and human episodic memory, out in @cp-trendscognsci.bsky.social! authors.elsevier.com/a/1lV174sIRv... Here’s a quick 🧵(1/n)
- Reposted by Alex BarnettHappy to share our study showing a new role for ventromedial PFC in prospection. tinyurl.com/e7kudkby #neuroskyence #psychscisky
- Reposted by Alex BarnettHappy 107th Birthday, Brenda Milner! Her contributions to neuropsychology shaped the way we understand the human brain. From surviving two world wars and two pandemics, to paving the way for future generations of researchers, Milner’s legacy continues. @mcgill.ca @cusm-muhc.bsky.social
- Reposted by Alex BarnettNature Communications A network correspondence toolbox for quantitative evaluation of novel neuroimaging results www.nature.com/articles/s41...
- Reposted by Alex Barnett🧠 Paper out! We investigated how hippocampal and cortical ripples support memory during movie watching. We found that: 🎬 Hippocampal ripples mark event boundaries 🧩 Cortical ripples predict later recall Ripples may help transform real-life experiences into lasting memories! rdcu.be/eui9l
