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How does the brain transform experiences into memories,
and how does memory influence experience?
We study how attention and perception affect what we remember, and
how memory can in turn guide our attention, perception, and goal-directed behavior.
the latest news
The Aly Lab is now at the Department of Psychology at UC Berkeley!!
We'll be recruiting, so please get in touch if you are interested in joining the lab! Prospective PhD students can check out this FAQ (we will be looking at applications this Fall).
How do we become curious about ambiguous images?
Congratulations to Mike, whose paper on perceptual curiosity was just accepted for publication in the Journal of Neuroscience! Check out our publications to see how neural representations of uncertainty are related to curiosity.
New doctor in the house!
Congratulations to Dr. Manasi Jayakumar for successfully defending her PhD dissertation!! Dr. Jayakumar conducted an elegant and thorough set of studies examining the link between attentional fluctuations and the temporal organization of memory. We are so proud of her!
How do our predictions change over days and weeks?
Congrats to Hannah on her exciting paper exploring how multistep anticipation is
transformed over periods of memory consolidation!
The paper is in press at Psychological Science, and you can find the preprint
on our Publications page.
Why are some people so good at learning and remembering obscure facts?
Trivia experts seem to be particularly good at linking new semantic knowledge to memory for the learning experience! Congrats to Monica and Lauren on their paper (in Psychonomic Bulletin & Review), which is featured in Scientific American! Check out the paper under our Publications tab, and keep your eyes open for some insights from Ken Jennings!
How do hippocampal computations support working memory?
In new collaborative work, we show seemingly distinct hippocampal contributions to long-term memory and working memory, and describe how this can be accounted for by computational models of the hippocampus. Find the paper on our Publications page!
How do we resolve competition between similar memories to behave adaptively?
Congratulations to Serra for her new preprint showing that hippocampal differentiation of competing memories reduces competition in visual cortex during memory-guided attention.
Check it out on our Publications page!
What makes an image memorable?
Congratulations to Chey for their new preprint investigating the relationship between how an image makes us feel and how memorable it is. Check out the preprint on our Publications page!
our philosophy
We like to do good science and have fun. At the same time, but also separately.
We are strongly committed to providing a positive, supportive lab environment.
To learn more, read our lab manual and browse our lab wiki.