Doctoral Training Centres - University of Edinburgh

Despite recent rapid advances in neuroscience, the depth of our insight regarding the brain, the most complex and sophisticated information-processing device known, remains limited. Similarly, over the last few decades we have seen tremendous advances in the areas of IT and computer science, yet our most advanced computer system is surpassed in many real-world tasks by, for example, the honey-bee. There are many points of contact between the neuroscience-related life-sciences (e.g., neuroscience, psychology, linguistics) and the information sciences and related disciplines (e.g., computer science, mathematics, statistics, physics and electrical engineering). This Doctoral Training Programme in the emerging interdisciplinary field of neuroinformatics (NI) capitalises on the potential synergies between these domains. The Programme has three major themes: 1) computational and cognitive neuroscience; 2) neuromorphic and neural engineering; 3) software tools and methods for advancing the first two themes. Through this DTP, the UK has the opportunity to take an early lead in developing the research skills necessary to be at the forefront of neuroinformatics.