Neurophysiology & Neural code

2010-2017: How do single neurons in our brain interprete and encode behaviourally-relevant information (features) from complex inputs? Using a combination of computational modelling and patch-clamp electrophysiology in acute hippocampal slices , I investigated cellular mechanims of neuronal tuning and feature selectivity, underlying their ability to respond flexibly to different inputs.  The results revealed how a finely-balanced spatio-temporal interaction between various ion-channels in hippocampal CA1 neurons, important for spatial and episodic memory, underly their ability to integrate spatially distributed inputs from multiple brain areas containing different input features. Based on this, I proposed a mathematical formulation that can incorporate the underlying neurophysiological complexity of single neurons in large neuronal network models including in artifical neural networks.