Untitled - Laboratory of Neurophysics and Physiology

with the simulation of networks of point neuron models. Some programming background in C++ is
helpful but not required. We will start with a refresher on setting up networks of neurons focussing
on customising the neuronal and synaptic parameters before, during and after creation of the network
elements. In the second part we will provide a hands-on demonstration of how to develop a new neuron
or synapse model for NEST. We will start from a skeleton and follow the process through to using
the new model in a network simulation.
References:
[1] Gewaltig & Diesmann (2007), NEST (Neural Simulation Tool), Scholarpedia 2(4):1430
T7
Advanced modelling of spiking neural networks with BRIAN
Space Curie, (9.00-12.20; 13.30-16.50)
Romain Brette, École Normale Supérieure, Paris, France
Marcel Stimberg, École Normale Supérieure, Paris, France
Victor Benichoux, École Normale Supérieure, Paris, France
Cyrille Rossant, University College London, UK
Nelson Cortés Hernández, École Normale Supérieure, Paris, France
Dan Goodman, Massachusetts Eye and Ear Infirmary, Boston, USA
Bertrand Fontaine, Albert Einstein College of Medicine, New York, USA
BRIAN [1,2] is a simulator for spiking neural networks, written in the Python programming language.
It focuses on making the writing of simulation code as quick as possible and on flexibility: new and
non-standard models can be readily defined using mathematical notation. This tutorial will present
the current state of development of BRIAN and will enable participants to adapt and extend Brian
to their needs. It will also cover existing Brian extensions (brian hears [3], model fitting toolbox [4],
compartmental modelling) and introduce “best practices” for complex simulations. Furthermore, it
will present strategies for improving the speed of simulations by using Brian’s C code generation
mechanism [5].
We strongly encourage interested participants to mail us further suggestions or comments beforehand:
marcel.stimberg{at}ens.fr. Note that this tutorial is not meant as a beginner’s introduction to BRIAN,
participants should either already use BRIAN in their research or be at least familiar with it (e.g. by
working through the tutorials available at [1]) before the tutorial starts.
References:
[1] http://briansimulator.org
[2] Goodman & Brette (2009), The Brian simulator, Front Neurosci, doi:10.3389/neuro.01.026.2009.
[3] Fontaine et al. (2011), Brian Hears: online auditory processing using vectorisation over channels,
Frontiers in Neuroinformatics 5:9, doi:10.3389/fninf.2011.00009
[4] Rossant et al. (2010), Automatic fitting of spiking neuron models to electrophysiological recordings,
Frontiers in Neuroinformatics, doi:10.3389/neuro.11.002.2010
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