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The long-awaited release of the complete FlyWire brain connectome and associated search engine for exploring it.Princeton FlyWire co-founders Mala Murthy and Sebastian Seung discuss their latest research findings, as part of the FlyWire collaboration, to reconstruct the Drosophila full brain connectome. The authors will share highlights from their recent Nature publications, in conversation with Nature senior editor, David Rowland. After their discussion, there’s a chance to ask questions.This webinar will explore:• The history of connectomics• The goal of the FlyWire group• An overview of what is included in the connectome• How the connectome is already being used• The future of the field• How you can use the online tools for exploring the connectomeWe invite you to hear their insights, ask questions, and contribute to this timely discussion.This webcast has been produced by Nature, who retains sole responsibility for content.SpeakersMala Murthy, Professor of Neuroscience, Princeton University
Mala Murthy is Professor of Neuroscience at Princeton University and Director of the Princeton Neuroscience Institute. The Murthy lab focuses on the neural mechanisms that underlie social communication, using the fruit fly Drosophila as a model system. Murthy received her B.S. in Biology from MIT and her PhD in Neuroscience from Stanford University. She did postdoctoral work in systems neuroscience with Gilles Laurent at Caltech, investigating stereotypy in the central brain of Drosophila, in a region of the brain important for learning in memory. Her research group consists of computational neuroscientists and experimentalists, who collectively study the many neural processes that underlie social communication and behavioral flexibility, including detection and recognition of multisensory cues, decision-making, execution and patterning of motor actions, and internal brain states.Murthy co-led the FlyWire consortium effort to generate the first whole brain connectome for Drosophila. Her work has led to the discovery that sensory feedback cues and brain internal states dynamically modulate song patterning in flies, which has opened up the study of how the brain mediates the back and forth exchange of information between individuals, leveraging the tools of the fly model system. Her team has also developed new methods for quantifying animal behavior that have been widely used in neuroscience research.Sebastian Seung, Professor of Computer Science and Neuroscience, Princeton University
Sebastian Seung is Anthony B. Evnin Professor in the Neuroscience Institute and Computer Science Department at Princeton University. He helped pioneer the field of connectomics, applying deep learning and crowdsourcing to reconstruct neural circuits from electron microscopic images. In 2012 he launched Eyewire, which is widely regarded as one of the most successful examples of citizen science, and was one of the first online systems to employ deep learning. In 2018, he co-founded the FlyWire Consortium, which released the first connectome of the fruit fly brain in 2023. His book Connectome: How the Brain’s Wiring Makes Us Who We Are was chosen by the Wall Street Journal as Top Ten Nonfiction of 2012, and The New York Times magazine profiled Seung in a 2014 cover story.Before joining the Princeton faculty, Seung trained at Harvard and Hebrew Universities, worked at Bell Laboratories (1992-8), and taught at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (1998-2013). He is External Member of the Max Planck Society. He chairs the Advisory Committee for the CIFAR Learning in Machines and Brains programme. Seung served as President of Samsung Research from 2020 to 2022.ModeratorDavid Rowland, Senior Editor, Nature, Springer Nature
David Rowland is a Senior Scientific Editor at Nature. He studied biology at Kenyon College. He then completed his PhD studies in biology at the University of Oregon and a postdoc on the neural basis of spatial memory at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology in Trondheim, Norway.Presented byNature