23. -25.10.2025
Outreach

Science Days – Europa-Park Rust

Mission Brain: Auf Schatzsuche im Kopf!

Wir sind Neurowissenschaftler der Uniklinik Freiburg und Teil von IN-CODE – wir erforschen, wie spezielle Nervenzellen (Interneurone) die Arbeitsweise unseres Gehirns beim Erinnern beeinflussen. Begib dich mit uns auf eine spannende Schnitzeljagd durchs Gehirn: Entdecke, wie du dich mithilfe von Ortscodes und Sequenzlernen orientierst! Erlebe, wie hemmende Nervenzellen für Ordnung und Rhythmus im Kopf sorgen (Hirnstromwellen!) und wie Nervenzellen als Team arbeiten, um Informationen zu speichern. Bei unseren Mitmach-Stationen brauchst du Teamgeist, Cleverness – und alle deine Sinne! Komm vorbei und finde heraus, wie dein Gehirn wirklich denkt und lernt!

26th -29th March, 2025
Conference Prize

Rina Patel received 2nd place for Best Talk Prize at NWG

Congrats to Rina Patel, PhD student in Silvia Viana da Silvas lab (B02). She presented at the NWG on the section “Breaking News” and received the 2nd prize for “Best Talk” for “Optogenetic control of mitochondria of PV+ interneurons alters CA1 function”.

6th -11th July 2025
Conference

Gordon Research Conference – Inhibition in the CNS

The Inhibition in the CNS GRC is a premier, international scientific conference focused on advancing the frontiers of science through the presentation of cutting-edge and unpublished research, prioritizing time for discussion after each talk and fostering informal interactions among scientists of all career stages.

The 2025 GRC Inhibition in the CNS will explore how inhibition shapes neural circuits in health and disease—spanning interneuron identity, synapse organization, sensory and memory pathways, computational dynamics, adult neurogenesis across models, and neuropsychiatric dysfunction.

16th – 21st May 2025
Conference

Spring Hippocampal Research Conference in Verona

The Spring Hippocampal Research Conference is devoted to all aspects of hippocampal structure and function, and its malfunction in neurological and psychiatric disorders. ​It has been held every other year since 1988. 

12.05.2025
FORUM IN-CODE

Nelson Rebola

Location
CCO Auditorium
Virchowweg 4 | Berlin

Please join us for the lecture, either in person or via Zoom.

Cortical GABAergic interneurons (INs) exhibit remarkable diversity, enabling finely tuned inhibitory control of cortical neural circuits. These INs primarily receive input through dendritic synapses. Yet, whether and how dendritic processing shapes their distinct functional roles remains unclear. In this last years we obtained evidence that two major cortical IN subtypes—somatostatin-expressing (SST) and parvalbumin-expressing (PV) interneurons—exhibit fundamentally different strategies to distribute and integrate synaptic inputs along their dendrites. SST-INs display NMDAR-dependent supralinear integration and a uniform distribution of excitatory synapses. In contrast, PV-INs show sublinear integration and a higher density of synapses on proximal dendrites, with low NMDAR expression. I will present experimental as well as modeling data suggesting that while both dendritic integration strategies enhance effective synaptic efficacy in thin dendrites, they enable the extraction of distinct temporal features from input dynamics. Overall, our findings highlight how specialized dendritic processing across interneuron subtypes critically shapes the strength and timing of cortical inhibition.

May 2025
Conference

2nd Engrams and Ensembles at Trinity College, Dublin, with Viana da Silva and Haberl labs

During the 2nd Engrams and Ensembles Conference at Trinity College Dublin in May 2025, the Viana da Silva and Haberl labs presented their findings on hippocampal engram recruitment by sharp-wave ripples. Their talks sparked lively discussions with leading experts and led to new collaborations with computational neuroscientists modeling the inhibitory engram.

23th April 2025
FORUM IN-CODE

Jessica Cardin

Location

Institute of Physiology
5th Floor
Hermann-Herder-Str 7 | Freiburg

Please join us for the lecture, either in person or via Zoom.

Link and passcode distributed by email from Dagmar Sonntag.

24th/ 25th April 2025
PhD Lecture

Human brain anatomy for Neuroscience graduate students

This course is a collaborative effort between the Neuroanatomical Departments of the University of Basel and the University of Freiburg. Many graduate students do their thesis projects in the field of Neuroscience, some even in close relation to human neurological diseases. As most of the graduate students do not have a training in human medicine they were never exposed to human neuroanatomy. The aim of this course is to give these students an opportunity to study human anatomy in a lab course with human specimens and learn about the structures of the human brain which are mostly affected by neurological diseases. The course offers an opportunity to learn human neuroanatomy in a group of graduate students from both the University of Basel and the University of Freiburg.

26th -29th March, 2025
Event I Conference

NWG Meeting 2025 I Symposia

26.-29.3.2025 Göttingen

More infos here: https://www.nwg-goettingen.de/2025/default.asp?id=0

 

“Dendritic Inhibition – Role in Network Dynamics, Memory and Behavior”

organized by
Marlene Bartos (Freiburg, Germany) and
Jörg Geiger (Charité, Berlin, Germany).

presentations by
Marlene Bartos
, Johannes Letzkus, Matthew Larkum and Panayiota Poirazi.

———

“Building blocks of the brain: Insights into CNS circuits and ultrastructure”

organized by
Matthias Haberl (Charité, Berlin, Germany) and
Martina Schifferer (DNZE, Munich, Germany).

13th March 2025
Outreach

BrAInWorlds: Die Welt in unserem Kopf

BrainLinks-BrainTools und NEXUS Experiments invite

Donnerstag, 13.03.2025

5:30 pm – 9:00 pm

IMBIT-Gebäude, Campus Flugplatz

background: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.neuron.2024.06.019

„BrAInWorlds: Die Welt in unserem Kopf“ ist eine öffentliche Veranstaltung im Rahmen der Brain Awareness Week, einer internationalen Initiative der Dana Foundation. Organisiert wird die Veranstaltung von NEXUS Experiments, der Plattform für Wissenschaftsvermittlung und partizipative Forschung am Zentrum BrainLinks-BrainTools der Universität Freiburg.

2025
Prizes

IN-CODE Fellows Prizes

We are pleased to announce that four outstanding researchers have been awarded fellowships of 15.000 Euro each as part of the IN-CODE initiative. These awards recognize the exceptional quality and potential impact of their proposed research projects. The following fellows and their respective projects have been selected for this honor:

Chotima Böttcher: Regional heterogeneity of human interneurons

Claudia Böhm: The role of GABAergic interneuroons in the lasting impact of early life adversity

Antje Kilias: Enhancer-mediated chemogenetic activation of interneurons in the medial septum as a potential anti-epileptic stimulation (EMStim)

Anna Schröder: Mapping neuronal diversity in the inhibitory zona incerta using spatial transcriptomics

03.02.2025
Forum IN-CODE

Francesco Ferraguti

Location
Institute of Physiology
5th Floor
Hermann-Herder-Str 7 | Freiburg

Please join us for the lecture, either in person or via Zoom.

Link and passcode distributed by email from Dagmar Sonntag.

 

2024
Outreach

Exploring AI and Neuroscience: Dr. Matthias Haberl’s Thought-Provoking Article in Neuroforum

Dr. Matthias Haberl dives into the fascinating intersections between artificial intelligence and neuroscience in their latest piece for the NWG Journal Neuroforum. Discover the insights and ideas on page 19—link below.

https://nwg-info.de/sites/nwg-info.de/files/media/pdf/neuroforum/Neuroforum_02-2024.pdf

Dec 2024 / Jan 2025
Outreach

IN-CODE Members Bring Science to Schools and Stars in Berlin

Gamze Güney and Dr. Svenja Steinfelder (Poulet lab) captivated young minds at the Heinrich-Schliemann-Gymnasium and Kurt-Tucholsky-Oberschule in Berlin, sharing the wonders of their science (Dec 2024 & Jan 2025). They also illuminated their research for a wide audience at the Planetarium Berlin, inspiring curiosity  for science in the community (Dec 2024).

https://www.mdc-berlin.de/de/news/events/svenja-steinfelder-gamze-guney-kalter-schnee-heisse-schokolade-wie-unser-korper

December 2024
Book Contribution

The Hippocampus Book, 2nd Edition

We are proud to announce that the second edition of

The Hippocampus Book

edited by Richard Morris, David Amaral, Tim Bliss, Karen Duff and John O’Keefe is now in print.

This second edition has been thoroughly revised and rewritten, bringing together recent work on the hippocampus and related structures, and features twenty detailed chapters, including a contribution by Marlene Bartos and Mark Eyre summarizing Inhibitory Interneurons, which can be found in Chapter 5: Cell Properties.

18.12.2024
Forum IN-CODE

Monique Havermans

Speaker Monique Havermans

Location
Institute of Physiology
5th Floor
Hermann-Herder-Str 7 | Freiburg

Please join us for the lecture, either in person or via Zoom.

Link and passcode distributed by email from Dagmar Sonntag.

More about EARA (European Animal Research Association): https://www.eara.eu/?lang=de

11.12.2024
Forum IN-CODE

Andreas Lüthi

Speaker
Andreas Lüthi (Home Institute: FMI, Basel, Switzerland)

Location
Institute of Physiology
5th Floor
Hermann-Herder-Str 7 | Freiburg

Please join us for the lecture, either in person or via Zoom.

Link and passcode distributed by email from Dagmar Sonntag.

More about Andreas’ research: https://www.fmi.ch/research-groups/groupleader.html?group=35

06. November 2024
Forum IN-CODE

Leena Ibrahim

Speaker
Leena Ibrahim (Home Institute: KAUST)

Location
Institute of Physiology
5th Floor
Hermann-Herder-Str 7 | Freiburg

Please join us for the lecture, either in person or via Zoom.

Link and passcode distributed by email from Dagmar Sonntag.

More about Leena’s research: https://faculty.kaust.edu.sa/en/persons/leena.ibrahim

October 2024
Sabbatical

Prof. Bartos’ sabbatical in Boston to strengthen international collaborations in Interneuron Research

In October 2024, Prof. Bartos undertook a one-month sabbatical in Boston to deepen collaborations with researchers known for their outstanding contribution in areas of interneuron development, interneuron-glia interactions, and the structural and functional dynamics of cortical interneurons. At Harvard University, Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and Brandeis University, Prof. Bartos met with Prof. Gina Turringano, Prof. Elly Nevidi, Prof. Eve Marder and Prof. Amar Sahay (to name a few) sharing insights on recent advancements in the field and cutting-edge methodologies. Prof. Bartos also attended the Society for Neuroscience annual meeting in Chicago.

 

30. October 2024
Forum IN-CODE

Johannes Gräf

Speaker
Johannes Gräf (Home Institute: EPFL, Lausanne)

Location
Institute of Physiology
5th Floor
Hermann-Herder-Str 7 | Freiburg

Please join us for the lecture, either in person or via Zoom.

Link and passcode distributed by email from Dagmar Sonntag.

More about Johanne’s research: https://www.epfl.ch/labs/graefflab/

25th October 2024
Event I Lecture

ONWAR Swammerdam Lecture by Marlene Bartos

The neuroscience community in Amsterdam invited Marlene Bartos to present in the prestigious ONWAR Swammerdam Lecture Series and afterwards hold a Masterclass with neuroscience PhD students.

https://www.onwar.nl/swammerdam-lectures/

10.-11. October 2024
Event I Conference

Berlin Neuroscience Meeting

OrganizerSilvia Viana da Silva

One of the keynote speakers: Marlene Bartos

at BNM24 on October 10 and 11, 2024.

More details here: www.ecn-berlin.de/program

06.09.2024
News

Anna Schroeder is awarded an ERC Starting Grant.

Dr. Anna Schroeder, a neuroscientist and postdoctoral fellow in the lab of Prof. Dr. Johannes Letzkus at the Institute of Physiology, Dept. I, was awarded an ERC starting grant for her project CERTASTATES. In this project, she will investigate how internal states drive behavioral flexibility with a focus on the neural circuits of the subthalamic zona incerta. Motivated by the fact that this little studied brain region is one of few established targets for deep brain stimulation in humans, the project also aims to explore how clinically-applied neuromodulation can transform state-driven computations with the aim to develop new therapeutic directions for psychiatric disease. To achieve these goals, Dr. Schroeder will employ cutting-edge molecular, cellular and circuit-level technologies in mouse models together with diverse behavioral paradigms and advanced machine learning techniques. CERTASTATES will be carried out at the Ludwig Maximilian University (LMU) of Munich, where, as of April 2025, Dr. Schroeder will be a tenure-track W2 Professor of Systemic Neuroscience.

 

For the official ERC press releases, click here and here.

 

Wednesday 3rd of July 2024 | 12:00
Forum IN-CODE

Sheena Josselyn

Speaker
Sheena Josselyn (Home Institute: University of Toronto)

Location
Institute of Physiology
5th Floor
Hermann-Herder-Str 7 | Freiburg

Please join us for the lecture, either in person or via Zoom.

Link and passcode distributed by email from Dagmar Sonntag.

More about Josselyn’s research: https://jflab.ca/

 

25.-29. June 2024
Event I Conference

IN-CODERs successfully presented at FENS

The FENS Forum 2024 was held in Vienna this June and a number of IN-CODERs went to successfully present their research.

June 2024
Network

IN-CODE is now part of METIS

The METIS network provides advice on how to promote gender equality, diversity and family friendliness in academic work environments in accordance to DFG guidelines.

You can browse the METIS page to see what other research associations did in terms of Gender and Diversity measures and approach the IN-CODE Gender and Diversity (GD) representatives with your inquiry.

METIS: https://www.metis.hu-berlin.de/

June 2024
Network

IN-CODE is now member of the Network of Neurocenters Germany

We are now part of the Network of Neurocenters Germany and as such got presented at FENS.

The Network of German Neurocenters is a group of research centers and funding institutions in the neurosciences, distributed all over Germany, who share the structual aim to strenghten Germany as a neuroscience research location.

More infos here: http://www.neurocenters-germany.de/

25.-29. June 2024
Event | Symposium

FENS Forum in Vienna

Silvia Viana da Silva (DZNE Berlin), in collaboration with Mark Brandon (McGill University), will host a symposium on Mazed and confused: The Neuronal Basis for Spatial Impairments in Alzheimer’s Disease’ on June 29th at the FENS Forum 2024 in Vienna.

More infos on Symposium S53 here: fens2024.abstractserver.com/program/#/details/sessions/202

Mai 2024
General News

IN-CODE on YouTube

The SFB Transregio 384 focuses on the study of inhibitory neurons to understand their role in information processing and coding in the brain. We are a consortium of 23 principle investigators (PIs) leading 19 teams of 75 researchers in Freiburg, Heidelberg and Berlin.

Welcome to our page that will gradually be filled with our research.

More information is also available on our website, sfb-trr384.de.

Check it out:

youtube.com/@science-at-sfb-trr384

Mai 2024
Press Release

Exciting Press Release (B04)

Gedanken fließen in eine Richtung statt in Schleifen.

Find more information here: dasgehirn.info/aktuell/neues-aus-den-instituten/gedanken-fliessen-eine-richtung-statt-schleifen

Original publication: dx.doi.org/10.1126/science.adg8828

18. & 19. April 2024
Event I Kick-Off

Kick-Off Meeting – Successful Start

We hope that you all had a good trip back home.

It was a great pleasure to meet you in person!

Many thanks for your attendance in Freiburg on April 18th and 19th.

18. & 19. April 2024
Event I Kick-Off

IN-CODE Kick-Off Meeting

Kick-Off meeting for our CRC/TRR 384 is happening!

Where: Freiburg
When: 18.-19. April

We are looking forward to all of you.
IN-CODE – Let’s go!

 

April 2024
General News

Welcome

… to all new PhDs and Postdocs!