Next Neuromod seminar: The statistician brain

The statistician brain: extracting regularities from probabilistic sequences of events

In this seminar, Claudia Domingues Vargas explore how the human brain identifies, anticipates, and consolidates probabilistic structures that underpin sequence learning. Both behavioral and computational research indicate that the effective learning of motor sequences hinges on the ability to discern statistical regularities within action sequences.
Recent studies (Hernández et al., 2024; Passos et al., 2024) have shown that learners swiftly detect context-dependent probabilistic patterns, dynamically adjusting their predictions and motor responses based on past successes or failures.

For instance, predictive errors influence subsequent response times, illustrating how motor behavior adapts to context-driven expectations. Claudia Domingues Vargaswill discuss these and other recent results that examine the neurophysiological mechanisms underlying statistical sequence learning.

Funding: Grants to the FAPESP grant to the Research, Innovation and Dissemination Center for Neuromathematics (NeuroMat, 2013/ 07699-0); FAPERJ (CNE E-26/204.076/2024); CNPq (310397/2021- 9; 407092/2023-4).

Biography of Claudia Domingues Vargas
Claudia Domingues Vargas holds a PhD in Biological Sciences (Biophysics) from the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro (1997).

She completed her postdoctoral studies at the Institut des Sciences Cognitives in Lyon (2001-2002). Since 2019, she has been a Full Professor and head of the Laboratory of Neurobiology of movement of the Institute of Biophysics Carlos Chagas Filho at the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro.
Her research focuses primarily on motor cognition, interactions between emotion and action, and plasticity in the motor system after central and peripheral lesions. Since 2012, she has also coordinated the Research Center in Neuroscience and Motor Rehabilitation, based at the Deolindo Couto Institute of Neurology of UFRJ.

Over the last 12 years, as an associate research member of the Center for Research, Innovation, and Dissemination in Neuromathematics (NeuroMat), funded by FAPESP, she has also dedicated herself to interdisciplinary research on stochastic modeling of sequence learning and cortical plasticity in humans.

Zoom link for the ones who cannot come
https://univ-cotedazur.zoom.us/j/88528506978?pwd=ifbYoddkbNJU8CPOlA4ZLQt0gIIP9u.1
Meeting ID: 885 2850 6978
Passcode: 477184