SPP 2411 “Sensing Loops” Annual Retreat 2026

Our lab participated in the third annual retreat of the Special Priority Programme 2411 on cortical and subcortical sensing loops. In this special priority programme of the German Research Foundation (DFG), different groups across Germany focus on studies of cortical-subcortical interactions in mammalian brains. Our lab has been funded by this program, allowing us to[…]

European Primate Veterinarians Annual Meeting 2026

Our lab was invited this year to present our work at the European Primate Veterinarians Annual Meeting, which took place right here in Tuebingen. Ziad gave a special plenary address highlighting the importance of primate investigations in neurobiology, and how the primate animal model is indispensable if we hope to fully understand the function and[…]

Cortex structure and function in mouse, monkey, and man

Our lab participated in a highly interesting workshop near Bremen this September! The workshop, titled “Cortex structure and function in mouse, monkey, and man” took place at the Hanse-Wissenschaftskolleg Institute for Advanced Study, and it was organized by Udo Ernst and Fred Wolf. The workshop focused on computational and neurobiological investigations of cortical and subcortical[…]

European Conference on Eye Movements 2026

Last week, our lab participated in the 23rd European Conference on Eye Movements, which took place in Ulm, Germany. Our lab had a total of five presentations at the conference, three talks and two posters. All presentations focused on the neural control of eye movements, which was an important addition to the conference’s other topics,[…]

Foveal action for the control of extrafoveal vision

We have a very exciting paper just published in PLOS Biology. In it, we demonstrate a causal role for tiny microsaccadic eye movements in influencing peripheral neuronal sensitivity and behavior, thus resolving long-standing debates on the types of functional and mechanistic links that can exist between microsaccades and covert visual attention shifts. More than two[…]

Primate Cognitive Neuroscience Summer School 2026

This year, our colleagues at the German Primate Center organized once again the Primate Cognitive Neuroscience Summer School. This time around, Wenbin attended the school, where he also presented his work on peri-saccadic visual processing in the superior colliculus, primary visual cortex, and human perception. Ziad was also a lecturer at this summer school, describing[…]

Japanese Neuroscience Society 2026

Our lab participated in this year’s Japanese Neuroscience Society Annual Meeting. Our contribution was part of a collaboration with our previous graduate student, Chih-Yang Chen! In our previous work, we had shown with Chen that visual sensitivity in the superior colliculus (SC) is enhanced prior to microsaccades. This was related to our broader efforts linking[…]

2026 Doctoral Thesis Prize for Matthias Baumann

Our congratulations go to Matthias Baumann, who is currently the latest PhD graduate of the lab! He was just awarded the 2026 Doctoral Prize by the Faculty of Mathematics and Natural Sciences at our university. The prize was presented to Matthias at the university’s latest graduation ceremony this summer. Matthias had submitted an outstanding PhD[…]

Simultaneous neuron evidence for much higher covariation with saccade timing in superior colliculus than primary visual cortex visual responses

Our lab has a new paper published in the Journal of Neurophysiology! The superior colliculus (SC) of human and non-human primates receives a large part of its visual inputs via direct anatomical projections originating in the primary visual cortex (V1). Consistent with this, the visual responses of non-human primate SC neurons have long been known[…]

Psychology and the Brain 2026

Our lab participated in an exciting symposium at this year’s PuG 2026 conference in Heidelberg, Germany. The symposium involved taking a motor perspective on the mechanisms of memory and attention, and it was organized by Xiongbo Wu from Munich. In the symposium, several speakers showed how neural mechanisms that had long been viewed as exclusive[…]