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To date, over 120 students have graduated from the 1+3 programme in Neuroscience. The choices of DPhil projects have been wide and varied, encompassing all of the departments where neuroscience research is carried out.

A selection of recently-submitted theses is listed below:

  • Synaptic plasticity models in brain development and neurodevelopmental disorders
  • Cortical regulation of sleep
  • Optical control of neocortical circuits to probe how connectivity influences behavioural salience
  • What are the brain specialisations underlying human vocal control?
  • A functional characterisation of retrorubral field dopaminergic neurons
  • Modelling Human Decision Under Risk and Uncertainty
  • On the Processing of Vowels in the Mammalian Auditory System
  • The Role of GABAergic Circuits in Stimulus Instructed Receptive Field Development
  • Electrophysiological Indices of Graded Attentional and Decision-making Processes
  • The Magnetoencephalographic Signature of Catechol-o-Methyltransferase
  • The Regulation of Postsynaptic GABAa Receptor Signalling in Epilepsy

Selected publications

 Over 570 publications have resulted from DPhil projects of the students who have graduated from the programme. Recent publications include:

Folloni D. Ultrasound neuromodulation of the deep brain. (2022) Science.377(6606):589.

Collins HM, Pinacho R, Ozdemir D, Bannerman DM, Sharp T. (2022) Effect of selective serotonin reuptake inhibitor discontinuation on anxiety-like behaviours in mice. J Psychopharmacol. 36(7):794-805.

Lazari A, Salvan P, Cottaar M, Papp D, Rushworth MFS, Johansen-Berg H. (2022) Hebbian activity-dependent plasticity in white matter. Cell Rep. 39(11):110951.

Kaanders P, Nili H, O'Reilly JX, Hunt L. Medial Frontal Cortex Activity Predicts Information Sampling in Economic Choice. (2021) J Neurosci. 41(40):8403-13.

Buchan MJ, Gothard G, von Klemperer A, van Rheede J. (2021) Diverse roles for the posteromedial thalamus in sensory-evoked cortical plasticity. J Neurophysiol. 125(2):537-9.

Lohse M, Dahmen JC, Bajo VM, King AJ. (2021) Subcortical circuits mediate communication between primary sensory cortical areas in mice. Nat Commun.12(1):3916.

Barron HC, Reeve HM, Koolschijn RS, Perestenko PV, Shpektor A, Nili H, et al. (2020) Neuronal Computation Underlying Inferential Reasoning in Humans and Mice. Cell.183(1):228-43 e21.

Bruggemeier, B., M. A. Porter, J. O. Vigoreaux and S. F. Goodwin (2018). "Female Drosophila melanogaster respond to song-amplitude modulations." Biol Open 7(6).

Nowak, M., E. Hinson, F. van Ede, A. Pogosyan, A. Guerra, A. Quinn, P. Brown and C. J. Stagg (2017). "Driving Human Motor Cortical Oscillations Leads to Behaviorally Relevant Changes in Local GABAA Inhibition: A tACS-TMS Study." J Neurosci 37(17): 4481-4492.

Butt, S. J., J. A. Stacey, Y. Teramoto and C. Vagnoni (2017). "A role for GABAergic interneuron diversity in circuit development and plasticity of the neonatal cerebral cortex." Curr Opin Neurobiol 43: 149-155.

Rajendran, V. G., N. S. Harper, K. H. Abdel-Latif and J. W. Schnupp (2016). "Rhythm Facilitates the Detection of Repeating Sound Patterns." Front Neurosci 10: 9.

van Rheede, J. J., B. A. Richards and C. J. Akerman (2015). "Sensory-Evoked Spiking Behavior Emerges via an Experience-Dependent Plasticity Mechanism." Neuron 87(5): 1050-1062.

Scholl, J., N. Kolling, N. Nelissen, M. K. Wittmann, C. J. Harmer and M. F. Rushworth (2015). "The Good, the Bad, and the Irrelevant: Neural Mechanisms of Learning Real and Hypothetical Rewards and Effort." J Neurosci 35(32): 11233-11251.

Willmore, B. D., J. E. Cooke and A. J. King (2014). "Hearing in noisy environments: noise invariance and contrast gain control." J Physiol 592(Pt 16): 3371-3381.

Cousijn, H., M. Eissing, G. Fernandez, S. E. Fisher, B. Franke, M. Zwiers, P. J. Harrison and A. Arias-Vasquez (2014). "No effect of schizophrenia risk genes MIR137, TCF4, and ZNF804A on macroscopic brain structure." Schizophr Res 159(2-3): 329-332.

Myers N, Wallis G (2013) Constraining theories of working memory with biophysical modeling. J Neurosci 33:385-386.

McHugh SB, Marques-Smith A, Li J, Rawlins JN, Lowry J, Conway M, Gilmour G, Tricklebank M, Bannerman DM (2013) Hemodynamic responses in amygdala and hippocampus distinguish between aversive and neutral cues during Pavlovian fear conditioning in behaving rats. Eur J Neurosci 37:498-507.

Tunbridge EM, Farrell SM, Harrison PJ, Mackay CE (2013) Catechol-O-methyltransferase (COMT) influences the connectivity of the prefrontal cortex at rest. Neuroimage. 68:49-54.

Hunt LT, Kolling N, Soltani A, Woolrich MW, Rushworth MF, Behrens TE (2012) Mechanisms underlying cortical activity during value-guided choice. Nat Neurosci 15:470-476.

Raimondo JV, Irkle A, Wefelmeyer W, Newey SE, Akerman CJ (2012) Genetically encoded proton sensors reveal activity-dependent pH changes in neurons. Front Mol Neurosci 5:68.

Kolling N, Behrens TE, Mars RB, Rushworth MF (2012) Neural mechanisms of foraging. Science 336:95-98.

O'Loughlin AJ, Woffindale CA, Wood MJ (2012) Exosomes and the emerging field of exosome-based gene therapy. Curr Gene Ther 12:262-274.

Wyart V, de Gardelle V, Scholl J, Summerfield C (2012) Rhythmic fluctuations in evidence accumulation during decision making in the human brain. Neuron 76:847-858.

Allen K, Rawlins JN, Bannerman DM, Csicsvari J (2012) Hippocampal place cells can encode multiple trial-dependent features through rate remapping. J Neurosci 32:14752-14766.

Deakin IH, Nissen W, Law AJ, Lane T, Kanso R, Schwab MH, Nave KA, Lamsa KP, Paulsen O, Bannerman DM, Harrison PJ (2012) Transgenic Overexpression of the Type I Isoform of Neuregulin 1 Affects Working Memory and Hippocampal Oscillations but not Long-term Potentiation. Cereb Cortex 22:1520-1529.

Gould IC, Nobre AC, Wyart V, Rushworth MF (2012) Effects of decision variables and intraparietal stimulation on sensorimotor oscillatory activity in the human brain. J Neurosci 32:13805-13818.

Itskov PM, Vinnik E, Honey C, Schnupp J, Diamond ME (2012) Sound sensitivity of neurons in rat hippocampus during performance of a sound-guided task. J Neurophysiol 107:1822-1834.

James R, Kim Y, Hockberger PE, Szele FG (2011) Subventricular zone cell migration: lessons from quantitative two-photon microscopy. Front Neurosci 5:30.

Line SJ, Barkus C, Coyle C, Jennings KA, Deacon RM, Lesch KP, Sharp T, Bannerman DM (2011) Opposing alterations in anxiety and species-typical behaviours in serotonin transporter overexpressor and knockout mice. Eur Neuropsychopharmacol 21:108-116.

Leknes S, Lee M, Berna C, Andersson J, Tracey I (2011) Relief as a reward: hedonic and neural responses to safety from pain. PLoS One 6:e17870.

Sallet J, Mars RB, Noonan MP, Andersson JL, O'Reilly JX, Jbabdi S, Croxson PL, Jenkinson M, Miller KL, Rushworth MF (2011) Social network size affects neural circuits in macaques. Science 334:697-700.

Oren I, Hajos N, Paulsen O (2010) Identification of the current generator underlying cholinergically induced gamma frequency field potential oscillations in the hippocampal CA3 region. J Physiol 588:785-797.

Verrall L, Burnet PW, Betts JF, Harrison PJ (2010) The neurobiology of D-amino acid oxidase and its involvement in schizophrenia. Mol Psychiatry 15:122-137.

Dahmen JC, Keating P, Nodal FR, Schulz AL, King AJ (2010) Adaptation to stimulus statistics in the perception and neural representation of auditory space. Neuron 66:937-948.

Dupret D, Pleydell-Bouverie B, Csicsvari J (2010) Rate remapping: when the code goes beyond space. Neuron 68:1015-1016.

Richards BA, Voss OP, Akerman CJ (2010) GABAergic circuits control stimulus-instructed receptive field development in the optic tectum. Nat Neurosci 13:1098-1106.