Very excited to welcome @IntBioPhysics newest PhD student Matheus Stefanini Mariano who did his bachelor and masters in physics at Universidade de São Paulo (USP) . Very much looking forward to work with Matheus on a variety of projects. In his doctoral research, he is planning to investigate how behavioral patterns, their temporal organization, and the objectives underlying them can be inferred from tracking data using machine learning methods. Ultimately, he aims to connect these data-driven representations with mechanistic models of the underlying behavioral dynamics. For more information, please check his website: matheus-stefanini-mariano.gi….

If you happen to be around NYU on May 4th , come see Jacob Davidson and myself speaking about our latest work developing algorithms for social behavior analytics. All details are on the poster below, reach out if you are around.

After three years of working on this review with my collaborator Emily Jane Dennis from Janelia Farm Research Campus , it is finally in press. The review provides an overview and our personal reflections on what constitutes an integrative approach to neurobiology of foraging. Pretty pertinent discussion today as foraging is becoming a topic of interest for many neuroscientists. Enjoy the review annualreviews.org/content/jo…

Can one bring together Reinforcement learning and Drift Diffusion models to unravel cognitive mechanisms underlying collective foraging ? Congrads to Jonathan Marienhagen , Lisa Blum Moyse and Dominik Deffner on this new study. Very happy that @IntBioPhysics postdoc Lisa and myself were part of this collaboration. Preprint here: osf.io/preprints/psyarxiv/a3…

Look at those cute NYC rats running around :D

So happy this paper is finally out in PRX Life (journals.aps.org/prxlife/abs… ) . Let me tell you more about the story of this paper in this thread : Foraging is my big passion and step by step I hope to develop a general theory of foraging , predicting decision strategies from the individual to the social. This time we are extending our foraging models to the social domain. Along with a very talented postdoc in my @IntBioPhysics group Lisa Blum Moyse , we developed an analytically tractable model to predict social foraging strategies in an egalitarian group . We assumed that agents would couple through different social information sharing mechanisms as shown in this figure and derived the strategies analytically , we got some exciting results:

Check out this exciting junior scientist workshop focusing on theoretical biophysics . Deadline June 10, 2025 Link: janelia.org/you-janelia/conf… We are inviting postdocs and graduate students working on a variety of problems in theoretical biophysics, broadly defined. Topics include but not limited to : Physical principles underlying biological function in molecular, cellular, multicellular systems Theory of organismal development Theory of animal behavior, ecological systems, and evolutionary dynamics Data driven identification of principles in biophysical systems Physics of active matter Non–equilibrium thermodynamics of living systems

If you are around in Berlin , make sure to mark your calendar on May 13th when I will be giving my seminar hosted by @liviadehoz . All details In this link : sfb1315.de/events/integratio…

Deadline for the Konstanz School of Collective Behavior 2025 is approaching. Apply now :D Deadline: April 15th, 2025.

One of the main insights of our new paper is that when studying social patch foraging, it is crucial to look beyond patch residence time , looking into metrics characterizing the accuracy of inferring patch quality and group cohesion certainly increase our understanding of decision strategies. Check more here : arxiv.org/abs/2503.02794

Check out this junior scientist workshop @HHMIJanelia that I am co-organising with @AllysonSgro and Magdalena Schneider on Theoretical Biophysics ( Application deadline: June 10th, 2025, website: janelia.org/you-janelia/conf…) . Participants will include only students and postdocs working on a variety of problems in theoretical biophysics, broadly defined. Topics include but not limited to : · Physical principles underlying biological function in molecular, cellular, multicellular systems · Theory of organismal development · Theory of animal behavior, ecological systems, and evolutionary dynamics · Data driven identification of principles in biophysical systems · Physics of active matter · Non–equilibrium thermodynamics of living systems

Plz RT: @CBehav @MPI_animalbehav Reminder that deadline is January 5th, 2025 School on the Origins of Life, Behavior and Cognition March 10-21, 2025 ICTP-SAIFR, São Paulo, Brazil Application Deadline: January 5th, 2025 School on Origins is an interdisciplinary school that tackles the foundational questions concerning the origins of biophysical systems which include but are not limited to : molecular, cellular, neural and behavioral systems. We aim to find principles shared across systems using tools from statistical physics, mathematical analysis and numerical simulations to explore these questions. We have invited researchers that work both on the experimental and theoretical side to cover a variety of biophysical systems and theoretical approaches. The school is aimed at graduate students either at the master’s or PhD level who have a strong quantitative background and a keen interest to pursue interdisciplinary research. We invite students pursuing degrees in physics, computer science, engineering, or mathematics. Those pursuing degrees in biology need to provide evidence of strong and extensive quantitative background in topics such as calculus, dynamical systems and numerical programming. There is no registration fee and limited funds are available for travel and local expenses. Organizers: Ahmed El Hady (Cluster of Excellence Centre for the Advanced Study of Collective Behaviour, University of Konstanz, Germany) Antonio C. Roque (USP Ribeirão Preto, Brazil) Daniel Y. Takahashi (UFRN, Brazil) Lecturers: Suzanne Still (University of Hawaii at Mānoa, USA) Randall Beer (Indiana University Bloomington, USA) Asif Ghazanfar (Princeton University, USA) Don Katz (Brandeis University, USA) Gandhimohan M. Viswanathan (Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Norte – UFRN, Brazil) Bruno Mota (Federal University of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil) Ana Amador (University of Buenos Aires, Argentina ) All details and application procedure can be found here: ictp-saifr.org/solbc2025/

Plz share and RT widely among your networks: Deadline is Dec 28, 2024 for a very exciting school in the beautiful city of São Paulo Brazil. School on Origins of life, behavior and cognition will take students into a tour de force through state of the art approaches in modeling cellular, biophysical and behavioral systems. We have a great line up of speakers and all info are on the website: ictp-saifr.org/solbc2025/ The school is also just after Carnival :D @CBehav @ictpsaifr @ictpnews @IntBioPhysics

Good morning everyone, our group at @CBehav and @MPI_animalbehav is pushing the boundaries of the theoretical understanding of social foraging. Check out the new study from my group @IntBioPhysics , preprint here: arxiv.org/abs/2412.02381 More to come in the coming months 😎

Foraging is my big passion and step by step I hope to develop a general theory of foraging , predicting decision strategies from the individual to the social. This time we are extending our foraging models to the social domain. Along with a very talented postdoc in my @IntBioPhysics group Lisa Blum Moyse , we developed an analytically tractable model to predict social foraging strategies in an egalitarian group . We assumed that agents would couple through different social information sharing mechanisms as shown in this figure and derived the strategies analytically , we got some exciting results:

Plz retweet this exciting school announcement 🙌🏾: School on the Origins of Life, Behavior and Cognition Dates : March 10-21, 2025 Location: ICTP-SAIFR, São Paulo, Brazil Application Deadline: December 28, 2024 All details and application procedure can be found here:  ictp-saifr.org/solbc2025/ School on Origins is an interdisciplinary school that tackles the foundational questions concerning the origins of biophysical systems which include but are not limited to : molecular, cellular, neural and behavioral systems. We aim to find principles shared across systems using tools from statistical physics, mathematical analysis and numerical simulations to explore these questions. We have invited researchers that work both on the experimental and theoretical side to cover a variety of biophysical systems and theoretical approaches. The school is aimed at graduate students either at the master’s or PhD level who have a strong quantitative background and a keen interest to pursue interdisciplinary research.   We invite students pursuing degrees in physics, computer science, engineering, or mathematics. Those pursuing degrees in biology need to provide evidence of strong and extensive quantitative background in topics such as calculus, dynamical systems and numerical programming.   There is no registration fee and limited funds are available for travel and local expenses.   Organizers: Ahmed El Hady (Cluster of Excellence Centre for the Advanced Study of Collective Behaviour, University of Konstanz, Germany.) Antonio C. Roque (USP Ribeirão Preto, Brazil) Daniel Y. Takahashi (UFRN, Brazil)   Lecturers: Suzanne Still (University of Hawaii at Mānoa, USA) Randall Beer (Indiana University Bloomington, USA) Asif Ghazanfar (Princeton University, USA) Don Katz (Brandeis University, USA) Gandhimohan M. Viswanathan (Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Norte – UFRN, Brazil) Bruno Mota (Federal University of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil) Ana Amador (University of Buenos Aires, Argentina )

I am resharing this amazing lecture by John Hopfield . I had the pleasure of attending it back in 2010 at the Kavli Institute for Theoretical Physics @KITP_UCSB program on theory in neuroscience and it shaped a lot of my thinking

Konstanz school of collective behavior is a great success. Can't wait for the 2025 version @CBehav . News : exc.uni-konstanz.de/collecti…. .