Excited to join the Toronto Area Memory Group (TAMeG) for #TAMeG2026 in May as keynote speaker! I’m especially looking forward to the panel discussion on scientific mentorship and how we support the next generation of scientists.
Grateful to my collaborators @drmack.bsky.social, @profdata.bsky.social & the whole team for their hard work seeing this through.
Read the full paper: www.jneurosci.org/content/earl...
We also found the hippocampus doesn't work in isolation.
During memory creation, it's functionally coupled with ventromedial prefrontal cortex and angular gyrus. During updating, it coupled with premotor cortex.
Same region, different networks, depending on what the learning moment called for.
The ventral striatum also tracked the shift between memory creation vs. updating, but only hippocampal activity predicted learning success.
How well the hippocampus separated those two operations early in learning predicted whether people mastered the task.
The anterior hippocampus showed distinct engagement for memory-creation vs. memory-updating events. These effects held up across different stimulus sets & were independent of whether individuals responded correctly when making memory decisions.
We used computational modeling to predict, trial-by-trial, the exact moments when learners updated a memory or created a new one.
We then asked what brain regions tracked the shift between these predicted operations.
Every time you experience something new, your brain faces a decision: Should it update an existing memory or create a new one?
In our new paper in @sfnjournals.bsky.social #JNeurosci, we isolate that exact decision, moment-by-moment during learning 🧵
One thing I've learned about grad student interviews is to stop asking "Why do you want to go to graduate school?" and start asking candidates to reason backward from the end of the PhD.
Who will you become?
What will you do that you couldn't before?
You learn so much more.
🧠✨ The future of science starts here!
The Preston & Church Labs will be at UT STEM Girl Day, hosted by @utwistem.bsky.social!
Visit us to:
➡️ Explore how memory works
➡️ Try our pretend MRI
➡️ Meet our research team
➡️ Learn how you can participate in UT research
Learn more: girlday.utexas.edu
Thrilled to be part of this event! Such a fantastic lineup and an exciting, interdisciplinary space for thinking deeply about spatial cognition. Looking forward to the conversations and encourage folks to submit!
✨ That’s our 2025 wrapped!
Thank you to our participants, students, collaborators & community for making this year such a success.
🎉 And the winner is… K-Pop Demon Hunters!
The Preston Lab’s top participant movie pick of 2025.
🍿 Drumroll, please…
Can you guess the Preston Lab’s top participant movie pick of the year?
🎤 From conferences to community spaces, we loved sharing our science & starting conversations about learning and memory.
🥼 Science is a team effort — and this year, it showed. An overall productive year for the Preston Lab.
🌟 Taking Neuroscience beyond the lab & into the community. We are so fortunate to have been able to connect with countless students & families this year about the research we are conducting & opportunities to get involved.
📈 From childhood through young adulthood — brains at every stage. Thank you again to all who participated this year!
🧠 The future of neuroscience starts here. We are so proud of our growing team of undergraduate researchers!
⏱️ 460 scanner hours later…and the hard work never stopped. Thank you to everyone who helped keep things running smoothly.
🌊 BrainWave, our new longitudinal study focused on adolescents, was our most participated study this year with 43 participants. We can't wait to see how these young minds continue to grow.
🙌🏻 Our research wouldn't happen without volunteers. We're so grateful for the 136 incredible participants that made our research this year possible - Thank you!
✨ That’s a wrap on 2025!
From research milestones to community connections, we’ve accomplished so much this past year. Here’s a look back at everything we did together...
(5/5)
These findings indicate that flexible mental mapping takes time to develop. Also helps explain why kids & teens can struggle to apply what they've learned in one situation to a new one—that brain infrastructure is still maturing!
Read more here: www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...
(4/5)
Adults could still navigate accurately & efficiently when the environment shifted because the anterior hippocampus helped them use their map across time.
Kids & teens didn’t have this ability, so they had to relearn monster locations after each change 🗺️
(3/5)
We linked this brain activity to navigation behavior using a virtual hide & seek game with friendly monsters.
If participants built a map of the space (rather than learn each monster location separately) they could use their map to find the monsters when the set rotated.
(2/5)
We put kids, teens & adults in the MRI while they rested or played a spatial memory game.
In kids & teens, the front (anterior) part of the hippocampus was less consistently active as events unfolded across time & space, while the back (posterior) part looked like adults.
(1/5)
🧵Our new preprint shows how the brain develops to transform how kids, teens & adults represent & navigate their world: shifting from local, moment-to-moment memories in childhood to integrated, global cognitive maps in adulthood 🧠
Paper: www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...
We love connecting with curious minds at UT Hot Science – Cool Talks, hosted by UT Environmental Science Institute! 🔬
We always have fun sharing the wonders of science with our community & watching their interest spark!
Are you in the Austin area? Check it out: www.esi.utexas.edu/community-en...
Looking for a nice way to build team connection before the holiday? Our lab drew names (gift exchange style) & shared aloud why we're grateful for that teammate, what makes us proud of them & how they strengthen the team. Such a sweet, grounding moment. Highly recommend 💛🧠
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Encouraging children & teens to manage their schedules independently has positive impacts for their memory!
Our new study reveals that age & independence combine to enhance memory development 🧵
Read here: osf.io/preprints/ps...
