Jorge Brea - Academia.edu (original) (raw)

Papers by Jorge Brea

Research paper thumbnail of Measuring direction in the coupling of biological oscillators: A case study for electroreceptors of paddlefish

Recently developed methods for estimating directionality in the coupling between oscillators were... more Recently developed methods for estimating directionality in the coupling between oscillators were tested on experimental time series data from electroreceptors of paddlefish, because each electroreceptor contains two distinct types of noisy oscillators. One type of oscillator is in the sensory epithelia, and another type is in the terminals of afferent neurons. Based on morphological organization and our previous work, we expected unidirectional coupling, whereby epithelial oscillations synaptically influence the spiking oscillators of afferent neurons. Using directionality analysis we confirmed unidirectional coupling of oscillators embedded in electroreceptors. We studied the performance of directionality algorithms for decreasing length of data. Also, we experimentally varied the strength of oscillator coupling, to test the effect of coupling strength on directionality algorithms.

Research paper thumbnail of Olfactory oscillations: the what, how and what for

Trends in Neurosciences, 2009

Olfactory system oscillations play out with beautiful temporal and behavioral regularity on the o... more Olfactory system oscillations play out with beautiful temporal and behavioral regularity on the oscilloscope and seem to scream 'meaning'. Always there is the fear that, although attractive, these symbols of dynamic regularity might be just seductive epiphenomena. There are now many studies that have isolated some of the neural mechanisms involved in these oscillations, and recent work argues that they are functional and even necessary at the physiological and cognitive levels. However, much remains to be done for a full understanding of their functions.

Research paper thumbnail of Biophysical model for gamma rhythms in the olfactory bulb via subthreshold oscillations

Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 2009

Gamma oscillations in the olfactory bulb can be produced as an interaction of subthreshold oscill... more Gamma oscillations in the olfactory bulb can be produced as an interaction of subthreshold oscillations (STOs) in the mitral cells (MCs) with inhibitory granule cells (GCs). The mechanism does not require that the GCs spike, and we work in a regime in which the MCs fire at rates lower than the fast gamma rhythm they create. The frequency of the network is that of the STOs, allowing the gamma to be modulated in amplitude with only small changes in frequency. Gamma oscillations could also be obtained with spiking GCs, but only for GCs firing close to population rate. Our mechanism differs from the more standard description of the gamma oscillation, in which the the decay time of the inhibitory cells is critical to the frequency of the network.

Research paper thumbnail of Measuring direction in the coupling of biological oscillators: A case study for electroreceptors of paddlefish

Chaos: An Interdisciplinary Journal of Nonlinear Science, 2006

Recently developed methods for estimating directionality in the coupling between oscillators were... more Recently developed methods for estimating directionality in the coupling between oscillators were tested on experimental time series data from electroreceptors of paddlefish, because each electroreceptor contains two distinct types of noisy oscillators. One type of oscillator is in the sensory epithelia, and another type is in the terminals of afferent neurons. Based on morphological organization and our previous work, we expected unidirectional coupling, whereby epithelial oscillations synaptically influence the spiking oscillators of afferent neurons. Using directionality analysis we confirmed unidirectional coupling of oscillators embedded in electroreceptors. We studied the performance of directionality algorithms for decreasing length of data. Also, we experimentally varied the strength of oscillator coupling, to test the effect of coupling strength on directionality algorithms.

Research paper thumbnail of Inference of demographic attributes based on mobile phone usage patterns and social network topology

Social Network Analysis and Mining, 2015

Research paper thumbnail of Harnessing Mobile Phone Social Network Topology to Infer Users Demographic Attributes

Proceedings of the 8th Workshop on Social Network Mining and Analysis - SNAKDD'14, 2014

Research paper thumbnail of On the regularity of human mobility

Understanding human mobility patterns is crucial to fields such as urban mobility and mobile netw... more Understanding human mobility patterns is crucial to fields such as urban mobility and mobile network planning. For this purpose, we make use of large-scale datasets recording individuals spatio-temporal locations, from eight major world cities: Beijing, Tokyo, New York, Paris, San Francisco, London, Moscow and Mexico City. Our contributions are twofold: first, we show significant similarities in people's mobility habits regardless of the city and nature of the dataset. Second, we unveil three persistent traits present in an individual's urban mobility: repetitiveness, preference for shortest-paths, and confinement. These characteristics uncover people's tendency to revisit few favorite venues using the shortest-path available.

Research paper thumbnail of Measuring direction in the coupling of biological oscillators: A case study for electroreceptors of paddlefish

Recently developed methods for estimating directionality in the coupling between oscillators were... more Recently developed methods for estimating directionality in the coupling between oscillators were tested on experimental time series data from electroreceptors of paddlefish, because each electroreceptor contains two distinct types of noisy oscillators. One type of oscillator is in the sensory epithelia, and another type is in the terminals of afferent neurons. Based on morphological organization and our previous work, we expected unidirectional coupling, whereby epithelial oscillations synaptically influence the spiking oscillators of afferent neurons. Using directionality analysis we confirmed unidirectional coupling of oscillators embedded in electroreceptors. We studied the performance of directionality algorithms for decreasing length of data. Also, we experimentally varied the strength of oscillator coupling, to test the effect of coupling strength on directionality algorithms.

Research paper thumbnail of Olfactory oscillations: the what, how and what for

Trends in Neurosciences, 2009

Olfactory system oscillations play out with beautiful temporal and behavioral regularity on the o... more Olfactory system oscillations play out with beautiful temporal and behavioral regularity on the oscilloscope and seem to scream 'meaning'. Always there is the fear that, although attractive, these symbols of dynamic regularity might be just seductive epiphenomena. There are now many studies that have isolated some of the neural mechanisms involved in these oscillations, and recent work argues that they are functional and even necessary at the physiological and cognitive levels. However, much remains to be done for a full understanding of their functions.

Research paper thumbnail of Biophysical model for gamma rhythms in the olfactory bulb via subthreshold oscillations

Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 2009

Gamma oscillations in the olfactory bulb can be produced as an interaction of subthreshold oscill... more Gamma oscillations in the olfactory bulb can be produced as an interaction of subthreshold oscillations (STOs) in the mitral cells (MCs) with inhibitory granule cells (GCs). The mechanism does not require that the GCs spike, and we work in a regime in which the MCs fire at rates lower than the fast gamma rhythm they create. The frequency of the network is that of the STOs, allowing the gamma to be modulated in amplitude with only small changes in frequency. Gamma oscillations could also be obtained with spiking GCs, but only for GCs firing close to population rate. Our mechanism differs from the more standard description of the gamma oscillation, in which the the decay time of the inhibitory cells is critical to the frequency of the network.

Research paper thumbnail of Measuring direction in the coupling of biological oscillators: A case study for electroreceptors of paddlefish

Chaos: An Interdisciplinary Journal of Nonlinear Science, 2006

Recently developed methods for estimating directionality in the coupling between oscillators were... more Recently developed methods for estimating directionality in the coupling between oscillators were tested on experimental time series data from electroreceptors of paddlefish, because each electroreceptor contains two distinct types of noisy oscillators. One type of oscillator is in the sensory epithelia, and another type is in the terminals of afferent neurons. Based on morphological organization and our previous work, we expected unidirectional coupling, whereby epithelial oscillations synaptically influence the spiking oscillators of afferent neurons. Using directionality analysis we confirmed unidirectional coupling of oscillators embedded in electroreceptors. We studied the performance of directionality algorithms for decreasing length of data. Also, we experimentally varied the strength of oscillator coupling, to test the effect of coupling strength on directionality algorithms.

Research paper thumbnail of Inference of demographic attributes based on mobile phone usage patterns and social network topology

Social Network Analysis and Mining, 2015

Research paper thumbnail of Harnessing Mobile Phone Social Network Topology to Infer Users Demographic Attributes

Proceedings of the 8th Workshop on Social Network Mining and Analysis - SNAKDD'14, 2014

Research paper thumbnail of On the regularity of human mobility

Understanding human mobility patterns is crucial to fields such as urban mobility and mobile netw... more Understanding human mobility patterns is crucial to fields such as urban mobility and mobile network planning. For this purpose, we make use of large-scale datasets recording individuals spatio-temporal locations, from eight major world cities: Beijing, Tokyo, New York, Paris, San Francisco, London, Moscow and Mexico City. Our contributions are twofold: first, we show significant similarities in people's mobility habits regardless of the city and nature of the dataset. Second, we unveil three persistent traits present in an individual's urban mobility: repetitiveness, preference for shortest-paths, and confinement. These characteristics uncover people's tendency to revisit few favorite venues using the shortest-path available.