The Turbulent Brain: Rhythms and Waves - Alain Goriely

00:00 // Introduction
01:14 // Electric Man: Hans Berger
07:39 // Micro: Neurons and spikes
10:17 // The Hodgkin-Huxley model
17:17 // Meso: Waves
18:31 // The Wilson-Cowan model
25:08 // Macro: Networks
29:39 // BOLD
34:39 // The functional connectome
40:59 // Information Theory
54:47 // Epilogue

Watch the Q&A session here:    • Q&A: The Turbulent Brain: Rhythms and...  

Despite its quiet appearance, the brain is the seat of complicated wave dynamics. Indeed, cognitive processes are carried out through communications between neurons, leading to synchronisation and oscillations at different frequencies that can be recorded. Together, these oscillations also create waves that propagate through different regions. Apart from this electrical activity, the brain is also the siege of slow chemical waves that can cause migraine and mechanical waves arising from trauma. In this lecture, we will study the influence of all these waves on brain function.

This lecture was recorded by Alain Goriely on 18th March 2025 at Barnard's Inn Hall, London.

Alain is Gresham Professor of Geometry.

He is currently the Director of the Oxford Centre for Industrial and Applied Mathematics and was elected as a Fellow of the Royal Society in 2022.

The transcript of the lecture is available from the Gresham College website: https://www.gresham.ac.uk/watch-now/t...

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