10 Simple Rules for a Supportive Lab Environment.

The transition to principal investigator (PI), or lab leader, can be challenging, partially due to the need to fulfil new managerial and leadership responsibilities. One key aspect of this role, which is often not explicitly discussed, is creating a supportive lab environment. Here, we present ten simple rules to guide the new PI in the development of their own positive and thriving lab atmosphere. These rules were written and voted on collaboratively, by the students and mentees of Professor Mark Stokes, who inspired this piece.

Previously Reward-Associated Stimuli Capture Spatial Attention in the Absence of Changes in the Corresponding Sensory Representations as Measured with MEG.

Studies of selective attention typically consider the role of task goals or physical salience, but attention can also be captured by previously reward-associated stimuli, even if they are currently task irrelevant. One theory underlying this value-driven attentional capture (VDAC) is that reward-associated stimulus representations undergo plasticity in sensory cortex, thereby automatically capturing attention during early processing. To test this, we used magnetoencephalography to probe whether stimulus location and identity representations in sensory cortex are modulated by reward learning. We furthermore investigated the time course of these neural effects, and their relationship to behavioral VDAC. Male and female human participants first learned stimulus-reward associations. Next, we measured VDAC in a separate task by presenting these stimuli in the absence of reward contingency and probing their effects on the processing of separate target stimuli presented at different time lags. Using time-resolved multivariate pattern analysis, we found that learned value modulated the spatial selection of previously rewarded stimuli in posterior visual and parietal cortex from ∼260 ms after stimulus onset. This value modulation was related to the strength of participants' behavioral VDAC effect and persisted into subsequent target processing. Importantly, learned value did not influence cortical signatures of early processing (i.e., earlier than ∼200 ms); nor did it influence the decodability of stimulus identity. Our results suggest that VDAC is underpinned by learned value signals that modulate spatial selection throughout posterior visual and parietal cortex. We further suggest that VDAC can occur in the absence of changes in early visual processing in cortex.SIGNIFICANCE STATEMENT Attention is our ability to focus on relevant information at the expense of irrelevant information. It can be affected by previously learned but currently irrelevant stimulus-reward associations, a phenomenon termed "value-driven attentional capture" (VDAC). The neural mechanisms underlying VDAC remain unclear. It has been speculated that reward learning induces visual cortical plasticity, which modulates early visual processing to capture attention. Although we find that learned value modulates spatial signals in visual cortical areas, an effect that correlates with VDAC, we find no relevant signatures of changes in early visual processing in cortex.

Polarity of uncertainty representation during exploration and exploitation in ventromedial prefrontal cortex.

Environments furnish multiple information sources for making predictions about future events. Here we use behavioural modelling and functional magnetic resonance imaging to describe how humans select predictors that might be most relevant. First, during early encounters with potential predictors, participants' selections were explorative and directed towards subjectively uncertain predictors (positive uncertainty effect). This was particularly the case when many future opportunities remained to exploit knowledge gained. Then, preferences for accurate predictors increased over time, while uncertain predictors were avoided (negative uncertainty effect). The behavioural transition from positive to negative uncertainty-driven selections was accompanied by changes in the representations of belief uncertainty in ventromedial prefrontal cortex (vmPFC). The polarity of uncertainty representations (positive or negative encoding of uncertainty) changed between exploration and exploitation periods. Moreover, the two periods were separated by a third transitional period in which beliefs about predictors' accuracy predominated. The vmPFC signals a multiplicity of decision variables, the strength and polarity of which vary with behavioural context.

Ultrasound modulation of macaque prefrontal cortex selectively alters credit assignment-related activity and behavior.

Credit assignment is the association of specific instances of reward to the specific events, such as a particular choice, that caused them. Without credit assignment, choice values reflect an approximate estimate of how good the environment was when the choice was made­the global reward state­rather than exactly which outcome the choice caused. Combined transcranial ultrasound stimulation (TUS) and functional magnetic resonance imaging in macaques demonstrate credit assignment­related activity in prefrontal area 47/12o, and when this signal was disrupted with TUS, choice value representations across the brain were impaired. As a consequence, behavior was no longer guided by choice value, and decision-making was poorer. By contrast, global reward state­related activity in the adjacent anterior insula remained intact and determined decision-making after prefrontal disruption.

The macaque anterior cingulate cortex translates counterfactual choice value into actual behavioral change.

The neural mechanisms mediating sensory-guided decision-making have received considerable attention, but animals often pursue behaviors for which there is currently no sensory evidence. Such behaviors are guided by internal representations of choice values that have to be maintained even when these choices are unavailable. We investigated how four macaque monkeys maintained representations of the value of counterfactual choices-choices that could not be taken at the current moment but which could be taken in the future. Using functional magnetic resonance imaging, we found two different patterns of activity co-varying with values of counterfactual choices in a circuit spanning the hippocampus, the anterior lateral prefrontal cortex and the anterior cingulate cortex. Anterior cingulate cortex activity also reflected whether the internal value representations would be translated into actual behavioral change. To establish the causal importance of the anterior cingulate cortex for this translation process, we used a novel technique, transcranial focused ultrasound stimulation, to reversibly disrupt anterior cingulate cortex activity.