About

The annual INCF Congress provides a meeting place for researchers in this emerging field. Neuroinformatics 2012 in Munich will be the 5th world Congress organized by INCF.

INCF

INCF is an international organization devoted to advancing the field of neuroinformatics. Our mission is to facilitate the work of neuroscientists around the world, and to catalyze and coordinate the global development of neuroinformatics. We also aim to foster scientific interaction through information flow within our global network; valuate neuroinformatics activities and infrastructures; and to facilitate training in neuroinformatics.

INCF receives contributions from our member countries, based on gross domestic expenditures on research and development. Karolinska Institutet and the Royal Institute of Technology are the host institutions of INCF. Further support is also received from the Swedish Research Council, the Swedish Foundation for Strategic Research and the National Science Foundation.This material is based upon work supported by the National Science Foundation under Grant No. 1120912. Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this material are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Science Foundation.

The annual INCF Congress series

The INCF Neuroinformatics Congress welcomes researchers in all fields related to neuroinformatics, including data- and knowledge-bases of the nervous system from molecular to behavioral levels; tools for the acquisition, analysis, and visualization of nervous system data; and theoretical, computational, and simulation environments for modeling the brain.

Neuroinformatics 2012

This year's program committee is headed by Professor Jan Bjaalie, head of the Institute of Basic Medical Sciences, University of Oslo in Norway, and former Director of INCF.

Program Committee

  • Jan Bjaalie (chair)
  • Thomas Wachtler (chair of the local organizing committee)
  • Keiji Tanaka
  • Jean-Baptiste Poline
  • Tim Clark
  • Seth Grant
  • Mary Kennedy
  • Nathaniel Heintz
  • Andrew Davison
  • Pontus Holm (Secretary)

Local Organizing Committee

  • Thomas Wachtler
  • Andreas Herz

Attendee contributions

Participants' presentations are vital components of the Neuroinformatics Congresses. The Munich meeting will feature sessions with traditional posters and live computer demonstrations.

2012 BCCN

Immediately following Neuroinformatics 2012, the same venue will host the Bernstein Conference on Computational Neuroscience. This is the annual meeting of the National Bernstein Network Computational Neuroscience (NNCN) that represents about 200 research groups from over 20 locations in Germany.

 

History

Neuroinformatics 2008 link

The first Neuroinformatics Congress was held in 2008 in Stockholm, Sweden, and attracted 267 attendees. The venue was beautiful Norra Latin in the very center of the city. The keynote speakers were this year's program committee chair, Mitsuo Kawato, the 2009 INCF Director Mark Ellisman, the 2010 program committee chair David Van Essen, Blue Brain Director Henry Markram, CalTech's Mary Kennedy and Frontiers in Neuroscience editor-in-chief Idan Segev. The keynote lectures can be viewed at the INCF YouTube channel.

Neuroinformatics 2009 link

The 2009 Neuroinformatics Congress took place in Pilsen, Czech Republic, and attracted 213 participants. In addition to the regular Congress program, this meeting featured an array of satellite meetings and courses, ranging from workshops on sensory neuroinformatics and neuroinformatics training to courses in image processing and Python programming. The attendees will always remember the visit to the Pilsner Urquell brewery and the subsequent beer testing and dinner. Keynote speakers were Shankar Subramaniam (UCSD), Astrid Prinz (Emory U), Arthur Toga (UCLA), Alon Halevy (Google), Andrew Schwartz (U Pittsburgh), and Kenji Doya (OIST).

Neuroinformatics 2010 link

The third INCF Congress was held in Kobe, Japan. It attracted 227 participants whereof half were from Japan and with an increased representation also of researchers from other east Asian countries. As a response to popular demand, the 2010 Congress featured two poster and demo sessions instead of one. The welcome reception featured a Noh play, a highly exclusive traditional Japanese masked song and dance drama, as well as the award ceremony for the INCF Image Competition. Keynote speakers were Upinder Bhalla (NCBS), Ryohei Kanzaki (U Tokyo), Maryann Martone (UCSD), Colin Ingram (U Newcastle), and Lee Hood (Institute for Systems Biology). The keynote lectures, the workshop talks and also the INCF Japan Node special session lectures can all be viewed at the INCF YouTube channel.

Neuroinformatics 2011   link

The fourth INCF Congress took place in Boston, USA, and attracted 275 attendees. Terry Sejnowski started off the scientific program and the first evening featured an outdoor welcome reception with a classic American rock band. The other keynotes were Allan Jones (Allen Institute for Brain Science), Kim "Avrama" Blackwell (George Mason University), Ed Callaway (UCSD), and Shin Ishii (Kyoto University).