Division of Electrical, Information and ResearchLab. ID
Brain-Like Information Processing
Communication Engineering
ｆieldEI24
Laboratory web site
Research subjects
Over the last decade, computational modeling of human neurons has been central not only to neurobiology but also
to computer science and many other fields. Much of this work has focused on how particular tasks orcomputations are implemented by neural networks to generate a behavior. As a consequence, the contribution of
single neurons and their dendrites has long been overlooked underestimated. More recently, it has become widely
accepted that dendrites play a key role in the overall computation performed by a neuron. However, the modelingof nonlinearity in dendrites and the assignment of the right synapses to the right dendrite remain open problems in
the field. Thus, we propose a new neuronal model that considers nonlinear interconnection and synaptic plasticity,
and we use the Exclusive OR problems and directionally selective cells to demonstrate dendritic nonlinear
computation and the neuron’s ability to learn. If correct, this model offers fundamental new insight to the neuron’s function and may help to predict cell morphology and the spatial distribution of synapses.
Master/Doctor course: Education policy, curriculum, typical activity in the laboratory
Master course: The first grade students will be given some papers, or conference papers on brain-like information
processing and asked to read them. The students give presentations and discuss their topics in a weekly
laboratory seminar. At the beginning of the second grade, the students decide their research subject for theMaster thesis after consultation with staffs. The students are encouraged to go for outer activities, participating
research workshops/meetings, international conferences, even foreign country institutes for months.
Doctor course: The Our laboratory has a weekly seminar to doctor course students. In the seminar, the doctor
course students have a chance to present their works, discuss and find out solutions to their problems. The
professors will give an individual weekly meeting with the doctor course students twice a month to see theprogress of their researches. The doctor course students must publish at least a journal paper for her or his
doctoral degree.
Daily life in the laboratory, etc.
Personal working desk with a personal computer is available for every student.
All relevant students of undergraduate, and Master share the laboratory rooms, and everyday free discussion on
brain-like information processing or related topics are strongly encouraged.
Many laboratory activities are organized like, welcome party for new comers, excursion, etc.
Message or comments by the laboratory faculty staffs
The mission of the Brain-like Information Processing Laboratory is to conduct state-of-the-art research andteaching that translates ideas from the brain sciences into new ways to design new computers. Researches onbrain are very hot and interesting. Recently, several experimental findings, such as directional selectivity in retinal
neurons and coincidence detection in the auditory system, have provided strong circumstantial support for
dendritic computation playing a key and possibly essential role in neuronal computation. However, no existing model
captures the important characteristic of dendritic nonlinearity. We proposed a novel neuronal model that mimics
the essence of known nonlinear interaction among inputs to the dendrites. We have also showed that the richnonlinear dendritic response and the powerful nonlinear neural computational capability of the model neuron, as
well as many known neurobiological phenomena of neurons and dendrites, may be understood and explained by thismodel.
Laboratory mail address

TODO YUKI <yktodo@se.kanazawa-u.ac.jp>