University of Hyderabad Centre for Neural and Cognitive S Two-Year M.Sc. Programme in Neural and Cognitive Sciences Summary Course Plan: Total: 76 credits ‘Semester 1 20_[Semester2 20 1. Introduction to Cognitive Science [4 1. Fundamentals oF 4 2. Introduction to Neuroscience 1 | 4 Statistics and research 3. Introduction to Computing 4 methodology 4. Cognitive Psychology 4 2. Introduction to 4 5. Introduction to Language Sciences | 4 Neuroscience Il - 3. Psycholinguisties 4 4, Formal and 4 ‘Computational Approaches to Cognition (including Mathematical Methods in Cognitive Science) 5. Introduction to 4 Philosophy of Mind ‘Semester3 18_| Semester 4 18 ‘Advances Courses Elective( 3 courses each) | 12 _| Project, 18 Lab Course Seminar NeSemester: I (Credits: 20) Introduction to Cognitive Science — Core Course — 4 Credits Introduction to Neuroscience | — Core Course — 4 Credits Introduction to Computing — Core Course— 4 Credits Cognitive Psychology — Core Course — 4 Credits Introduction to Language Sciences — Core Course — 4 Credits neene Semester: II (Credits: 24) Fundamentals of Statistics and research methodology — Core Course — 4 Credits Introduction to Neuroscience II - 4 credits Psycholinguistics — Core Course— 4 Credits Formal and Computational Approaches to Cognition (including Mathematical Methods in Cognitive Science) — Core Course — 4 Credits 5. Introduction to Philosophy of Mind — Core Course — 4 Credits Bepe Semester: III (Credits: 20) I. Three Advanced Courses (4 Credits each) (Three electives to be chosen ).~ 12 credits i. Behavioral Neuroscience — Advanced Course —4 Credits Neurogeneties— Advanced Course—4 Credits Model organisms in Neuroscience research — Advanced Course — 4 Credits Computational Neuroscience — Advanced Course ~ 4 Credits Cognition and Action ControL Advanced Course ~4 Credi Language, Vision and Attention — Advanced Course —4 Credits Learning and memory — Advanced Course — 4 Credits Molecular Neuroscience— Advanced Course — 4 Credits 2. Lab Course—4 Credits 3. Seminar—2 Credits Semester: IV (Credit: 18) 1. Research Project [in either (a) Cognitive Science or (b) Neuros (Proposal + Mid term evaluation + Final evaluation) Students are expected to do a project (25 marks supervisor for project performance + 25 marks supervisor for project thesis + 25 marks for presentation + 25 marks non supervisor evaluation of thesis = 100 marks Total) ce]: — 18 CreditsSyllabus Introduction to Computing: 4 credits. Introduction Students come from a variety of background to the program. This course aims to lay foundation for students with 10" level math to face a more advanced course “Formal and Computational approaches to Cognition” in the following semester. This course includes introducing, basic 10+2 level math for computational approaches and achieving basic proficiency in programming to apply these approaches. Recommended background Students are expected to have a background of 10! level math, Course Outline Unit | Sets, Ordered pairs, Relations, Functions. Introduction to logic Unit I What is analog? What is digital? What is a digital computer? What is an analog computer? How do numbers in the physical world correspond to numbers in the computer? How do we go from physical analog measures to digital world’ Sampling and intuitive notion of Nyquist sampling theorem Basies of probability and statisties. Unit TL Notion of series of numbers, vectors (array notation and geometric interpretation). Notions of magnitudes and phase/(extension of direction). Operations on vectors, addition, scalar multiplication, dot product. Measures of differences and similarities.2-norm versus I-norm as examples. Basics of differentiation and integration. Unit IV Notion of invertibility and multiple solutions. Basic optimization theory.Notion of cost funetion and their desirable properties. Notions of solving systems of equations with constraints.Basics of signals and systems. Properties of LTI systems.Impulse response function, Frequency domain and time domain representation of systems Unit V What is a model? What are features of good models? Occam’s razor principle. Models of signals.Time, Space and Frequency domain representations. Models of systems,Linear/Nonlinear, Time invariant/variant systems.Notion of state in a system.System identification, Reading Material:1) Bergmann, M. ef al (2013) The Logic Book. 6"ed, New York: McGraw Hill 2) Getting Started With Matlab: A Quick Introduction For Scientists And Engineers; RudraPratap; Oxford, 2009 3) Signals Analysis, A. Papoulis, MeGraw Hill 4) The Logic Manual, Volker Halbach, OUP. Formal and Computational Approaches to Cognition: 4 credits. Introduction This course gives foundations of computational approaches to neural and cognitive science form connectionist, Al and formal approaches. Recommended background ‘The students are expected to have taken the prerequisite course Computational Methods. Unit | Models of neurons and its simulation: Hodgkin and Huxley, Reduced models and Integrate and fire models. Synaptic mechanisms and their modeling.Cognitive architectures: ACT-R, SOAR, EPIC. Unit I Artificial Neural Networks: Perceptron, Linear seperability problem, Back propagation. Deep learning Supervised and Unsupervisedlearning. Hopfield network Unit HL Neural coding and plasticity: Linear nonlinear models, Information theoretic models, Reinforcement Learning. Bayesian approaches. Dynamical Causal Modeling. Unit IV Propositional logic.Predicate logic. HMMs. POS tagging. Co-occurancevectors. Representation of meaning. Computational discourse. Unit V Issues in Artificial Cognitive Systems II (High level agents): Modeling attention, memor Making robots move, Multi Agent Systems, Modeling TOM, Designing Sociable Robots. Deep learning. Reading Material: 1) Computational Neuroscience: Dayan and Abbot; MITT Press2) Speech and Language Processing: Daniel Jurafsky and James H Martin; Pearson Education 3) The Logic Manual, Volker Halbach, OUP. 4) Designing Sociable Robots: Cynthia L. Breazeal; MIT Press Stati s and Research methodology: 4 cred Introduction: The prime objective of the course is to to introduce students to quantitative and qualitative methods for conducting meaningful inquiry and research, Recommended background Students are expected to have basic science background equivalent to the UG level. Course Outline Unit [: Quantitative research preliminaries Essence of qualitative data, defining the research problem, framing the hypothesis, sampling, collection techniques, interpretation of qualitative dataDiagrammatic, graphical and tabular representations of data; measures of central tendency, dispersion, skewness and kurtosis, linear regression, Unit II: Quantitative research | Pearson correlation coefficient and Rank correlation.Basic concepts of hypothesis testing, level significance, p value, t Test for mean and difference between two means, partial t-test. Unit III: Quantitative research II Chi square test for goodness of fit, Analysis of variance for one way data. Multivairate ANOVA. Unit [V: Fundamentals of research Objectives and types ofresearch, Research design and methods, review of literature and planning of research, ethics and informed consent Unit V: Sampling and tools Sampling techniques, sample size, methods and tools of data collection, processing of data and its analysis, Types of report, Principles of writing, documentation, typing and writing of report and briefing Unit VI: The scientific literature ~ primary, secondary, and tertiary literature; Database searches — tools and strategies; Reading and evaluating the scientific literature; Academic writing — plagiarism and referencing, format and style; Writing a literature review. Reading Material:1. Research Methodology: Methods and Techniques by C. R. Kothari, New Age International Publishers, ISBN:81-224-1522-9 2. Statistical Methods for Research Workers by Fisher R. A., Cosmo Publications, New Delhi ISBN:81-307-0128-6 3. Statisties by Norma Gilbert, WB Saunders Co., 1976. Introduction to Neuroscience I: 4 credits Introduction: This course is an introduction to highlight the fundamental principles of the function and organization of the nervous system. It provides an overview of experimental approaches to study nervous system. This course is meant as a foundation for research in neuroscience. Recommended Background: Students are expected to have a background of 10" level biology, chemistry, physics and mathematics. Course Outline Module 1: History of the Study of Brain Views of the brain in (1) Ancient Greece, (2) the Roman Empire, (3) the Renaissance, and (4) the Nineteenth Century.Camillo Golgi. Santiago Ramon y Cajal: Neuron doctrine. Charles Sherrington, Landmark discoveries to understand brain function in twentieth century and beyond. Module 2: Introduction to Molecular and Cellular Biology of Neuron Introduction to molecular biology. Gene, DNA. RNA. Protein. DNA Replication. Gene expression. ‘Transcription. Translation. RNA splicing, Introduction to cell biology. Cell doctrine, Cell membrane. Nucleus. Endoplasmic reticulum. Ribosomes. Golgi apparatus. Mitochondria. Cytoskeleton. Neurons. Soma. Axon, Dendrites. Dendritic spines. Axonal Transport. Glia. Module 3: Cellular Neurophysiology Equivalent circuit model of neuronal membrane.Ohm’s law.Resting membrane potential: equilibrium potential, Nernst equation and constant field equation or Goldman-Hodgkin-Katz, (GHK) equation. Action potential: generation and propagation. Threshold.Refractory period. Key experiments that led to our current understanding of ionic basis of resting and action potentials. Squid giant axon as a model system to study neurophysiology.Conduetion velocity in unmyelinated and myelinated axons.Multiple sclerosis as a disease of demyelination. Voltage clamp and patch clamp recording techniques. Drugs and toxins as tools in neuroscience research.Cell biology of electrical and chemical synapses. Molecular and cellular mechanisms of synaptic transmission. SNARE hypothesis. Neuropharmacology of synaptic transmission. Calcium regulation of synaptic transmission, Module 4: Cognitive Neuroscience Introduction to Cognitive Neuroscience. Learningand memory. Types of memory. Hippocampus. Studies on H. M. and London taxi drivers” brain. Molecular and cellular mechanisms of memory consolidation, Synaptic plasticity. Long-term potentiation (LTP). Adult neurogenesis. ERP and fMRI as tools to study human cognition. Brain aging and cognition. Module 5: Introduction to Structure of the Nervous System Introduction to funetional neuroanatomy of human brain.Introduction to Central nervous system (CNS), autonomic nervous system (ANS), and peripheral nervous system (PNS). Reading Material 1. Neuroscience, Fifth Edition (2012). Edited by Dale Purves, George J. Augustine, David Fitzpatrick, William C. Hall, Anthony-Samuel LaMantia, and Leonard E. White.Sinauer Associates Inc. 2. Principles of Neural Science, Fifth Edition (2012). Edited by Eric Kandel, James Schw ‘Thomas Jessell, Steven Siegelbaum, and A.J, Hudspeth. McGraw-Hill Professional.Introduction to Neuroscience-II: 4 credits Introduction: ‘The prime objective of the course is to provide an exposure to fundamental concepts of structure, function and underlying molecular biology of the human brain, which will be. of mmense help to understand the neurophysiology and neuropathology with respect to cog! ders. Recommended background Students are expected to have basic physics, chemistry and biology background equivalent to the intermediate/10+2/PUC level. Course Outline Unit I: Neuro-Anatomy I Neuron and glial cells; general anatomy of the human brain; Subdivisions of the nervous system: CNS, ANS and PNS; Composition, formation and functions of CSF, Cranial and spinal nerves; Blood-brain barrier; neural control of muscle tone and posture Unit Il: Neuro-Anatomy II Overview of brainstem and spinal cord, Thalamus, basal ganglia, limbic system, Cerebral cortex and Cerebellum Unit III: Developmental neurobiology Basic events in early embryonic development, neural induction, morphogenesis, neurotrophic factors, differentiation of neurons, axon guidance, programmed cell death and brain ageing Unit IV: Neuropathology Headache, Migraine, Myasthenia gravis, Strokes, Epilepsy, Alzheimer Disease, Multiple Sclerosis, Huntington Disease, Parkinson Disease, Neurofibromatosis | Unit V: Senses Neurobiological basis of : Vision, Audition, Touch, Smell, Taste Reading Material: Longstaff: Neuroscience (2002, Viva Books) Shepherd: Neurobiology(1994, Oxford Univ Press) Squire et al: Fundamental Neuroscience(2003, Academic Press) Eric Kandel: Principles of Neural Science (2000, McGraw Hill) Principles of Development, 3rd ed. (Lewis Wolpert) vaeRSIntroduction to Philosophy of Mind: 4 credits. Introduction and Credits ‘The main of this course is to provide a detailed and analytical introduction to classical and contemporary issues /theories in Philosophy of mind as they are reverent for understanding theoretical and empirical discussions in Cognitive science. The course will pay close attention to theoretical positions in Philosophy of mind that are crucial for a holistic understanding of mental and cognitive phenomena in a range of situations. The course is further aimed at developing critical theoretical understanding in students with respect to issues on mind and brain. They should be better at evaluating and interpreting theoretical and empirical facts. Recommended background No specific background is necessary Course Outline Unit I Introduction to Philosophy of Mind Basie introduction to pre Cartesian philosophy, Cartesian dualism, foundational issues in philosophy of mind and cognitive sciences Unit I ‘The mental and the physical, Mind-body problem, substance dualism, property dualism, Materialism and Physicalism, Reductive and non-reductive physicalism, types of materialism Unit TL Behaviourism and Computationalism Mind as a computer, Philosophical relevance of connectionism and PDP modelling, Objections to Computationslism, The Chinese room argument, Unit IV Mind and ,Functionalism, Identity theories, arguments against materialism.arguments of Smart, Kripke, Searle, Eliminative materialism, Reductionism, Jackson, Armstrong, Place, Michel Tye, Putnam and others, Epiphenomenalism, Psychophysical laws and anomalous monism, The supervenience argument, Unit V Different views of consciousness, Phenomenal and access consciousness, Subjectivity,Representationalism, Neurophilosophical views of consciousness, explanatory and the hard problem, the limits of physicalism, Psychological explanations of Consciousness, Consciousness and awareness, Recent experimental approaches to the study of consciousness, phenomenological approaches to consciousness, Searle’s biological naturalism, Panpsyciism, Other non-mainstream theories of mental causation Reading Material: Core text: Philosophy of Mind by Jaegwon Kim Companion text: Mind : A brief introduction by J R Searle Additional reference texts: Philosophy of Mind: Classical and contemporary readings by David Chalmers Matter and Consciousness by Paul M Churchland An introduction to the philosophy of mind by E J Lowe Psycholinguisties 4 eredits Objectives: The main aim of this course is to provide a detailed and analytical introduction Psychological and Neurobiological processes/models in language sciences and language - cognition interface. The course is designed to give students a critical understanding into the various cognitive mechanisms that sub-serve language processing le range of cases as they are reverent for understanding theoretical and empirical ‘The course will pay close attention to theoretical positions in Psycholinguistics as they inform ing of mental and current work in Cognitive Science that are crucial for a holistic understani cognitive phenomena in a range of situations. At the end of the course, students should be equipped to think about research ideas and implement them dealing with different Psycholinguistic issues and they should also see how language interacts with other important cognitive processes like attention, memory and vision. Pre-requisites: Basie background in Cognitive science, Attention, perceptual sciences inguistics and Course Outli Unit I: Foundational issues in linguistics and communication Different schools of linguistic thought, syntax, semantics, morphology, Pragmatics, Chomskyan linguistics, language evolution, design features, Brain basis of language,animal communication, Methods in Psycholinguistics, Research and analytical tools, Language- n interface, Modularity, language and thought Unit II: Sentence processing ( Comprehension and production and reading) Models of parsing, Two stage models, Constraint based models, Ambiguity resolution, Working memory based models, Argument structure hypothesis, alternative models of parsing, Sentence reading, Eye movement models of sentence reading, neuro-biological basis of sentence processing, Sentence processing in aphasia, Sentence production, Planning and conceptualization Unit II: Processing Speech/words ( Comprehension and production) Speech perception, fundamentals of acoustic phonetics, Neural basis of Speech perception, Theories and models of visual world recognition, word recognition in dyslexia, Spoken word recognition, Visual world paradigm, Models and theories of word naming, lexical access, lexical ambiguity resolution UnitlV: Discourse and norliteral language processing. Construction-integration theory, The structure building framework, The event indexical model, Situation models, Inferencing, Metaphors, Processing models of nom-literal language, Fictive motion, Embodiment, Neural basis ofnon-literal language processing Unit V: Bilingual and child language processing Different models of bilingual language processing, parallel activation lexicon, Bilingual language control, Neural basis of bilingualism, language development, Infant perception and speech categorization, acquisition of morphological and syntactic knowledge, learning word meanings Unit VI: Interaction of language-vision-attention Multi modal interaction, Attention in language, Interaction of language and vision, Models and theories of language-vision interaction, Modularity and automaticity in processing Readings: Core text: Introduction to Psycholinguistics : Understanding language sciences by Matthew ‘Traxler Companion texts: Mind : ‘The Psychology of Language by Gerry AltmannAdditional readings: Time to time selected journal articles will be discussed as part of specific modules. These articles will be given in advance and students are asked to come prepared for discussions. Lab course: 4 credits Objectives: To develop capabi Neural and Cognitive Sciences. in conducting basic experiments required in the field of Syllabus Immunohistochemistry ii, Recording from sensilla i. Patch clamp and field potential recording iv. Tetrode recording ‘. PER conditioning and visuomotor responses in honeybee Vi. Behavioral experiments using Drosophila ii, Al Programming (Robotics) viii, Neural Networks and Machine Learning (Matlab / Python Programming) ix. Computational Neuroscience Simulations (Genesis / Neuron) x. Reaction time measurement xi. Eye tracking xii, Event related potential Seminar : 2 credits Objective: To train in reading scientific literature et mode. ally and presenting them in written and oral 1. The student shall choose an area other than the area of thei project and read a set of papers in that area and write a critical review, 2. The student shalll present this review in an oral presentation.Cognitive Psychology: 4 Credits Objectives: The main of this course is to provide a detailed and analytical introduction ve psychology. Students are expected to lean in-depth notions about several important cognitive psychological theories and facts. Unit one: Human cognition, historical perspective, cognitive revolution, information processing models, brain basis of cognition, embolism Unit two: Object recognition, visual perceptio selective attention, vision and eye movements, applied vision, top-down and bottom up theories of vision 1, and change blindness, theories of Unit three: Theories of attention, neural basis of attention, attention and action control, developmental and acquired disorder of attention, Executive control and atten n, nit four: Neural basis of consciousness, awareness and consciousness, disorders of ‘ion, experimental studies of consciousness, global works space theot Unit five: Cognitive psychology of decision making, eye tracking studies of decision making, voluntary actioncontrol and free will, neural basis of decision making, emotion and decision making Books; Pinker, S. (1997). How The Mind Works. New York, NY: W. W. Norton.