2025 CapoCaccia Neuromorphic Workshop (CNEW 2025)

Synaptic Tempests: Beyond the Cortical Veil  with Florian Engert, Gilles Laurent, Nuno da Costa,  and Henry Kennedy Author: Shreya Kshirasagar W elcome and quick update on today's weather. Why do you think I don't need an umbrella or a coat today? Well, its a bright sunny day with temperate air. 18-19°C as per reports.  Not bad to tag along your favorite UV-blocking sunglasses. Don't compromise on your style or safety - choose the best for your vision today.  On the side note: diurnal animals have evolved to specialized adaptations in order to naturally protect their retinas from harmful ultraviolet radiation. Snowy owls are a great example of  delaying the release of toxic all-trans retinal, a molecule that can damage photoreceptor cells, in the retina. Think about what are the conditions that the snowy owl has to survive. Imagine a snowy owl with sunglasses, that'd be strikingly obnoxious like their eyes that most certainly command attention and inspire awe....

Evolution's Playbook: Convergence, Inheritance, and the Making of Brains: Gilles Laurent and Florian Engert Today's first session shifted our focus from the how of building neural circuits to the why they are the way they are. Led by Gilles Laurent , we explored the long timescales that have shaped nervous systems across the animal kingdom. Setting the Stage: Deep Time and Shared Origins Gilles began by laying out the timescales at which evolution operates. Life itself arose remarkably early on Earth (~4 billion years ago), with fundamental molecular building blocks like ion channels and neurotransmitter systems appearing long before complex nervous systems, often originating in single-celled organisms like bacteria. Neurons took a lot longer to appear on the stage, something like 600 million years ago. This coincides with the Precambrian/Cambrian boundary, where animal life diversified explosively, setting lineages like ours (vertebrates) and cephalopods or insects on indepe...

Welcome everyone to this workshop's daily blog. Chiara Bartolozzi welcomed everyone to the start of the workshop. Two new things this year: Discussion leaders will select 2 people from audience to lead questions Organizers will select a single moderator for each session Chiara B pointed out that the main aim of the workshop is to discuss future directions in light of SOA. Andre van Schaik suggested that to network, people should sit with different people at each meal. Giacomo Indiveri showed everyone some main features of new IT setup and who is doing this support ( Kathrin Aguilar , Simone Schumacher , Chiara de Luca , Noah Lawrence ).   The hotel finally has a wired 900Mbps connection, which should improve things compared to the cross-water wireless internet of previous years. Saray Soldado , Andre and Chiara B organized the program and selected the participants for the roughly 100 people who fit in the hotel. The program overview is planned to be  Internal and post w...