Understanding the human brain is one of the last frontiers of science. Hence not surprisingly, many research groups and companies spend much time and resources into the cognitive neuroscience. This, in turn, results in many novel and exciting findings, which fuel public interest. I.e., cognitive neuroscience is hot, as can be seen from the wide range of newspaper articles, books, movies, and series alluding to the brain.

In the context of AI, neuroscience is a constant source of inspiration, ranging from artificial neural networks to cognitive robotics. Vice versa, AI techniques are extremely useful in the understanding of the brain, by allowing advanced brain imaging analysis and modelling (parts of) the human brain. Not surprisingly, many AI graduates from Nijmegen keep the brain as inspiration later in their career, either when working in industry or as researchers in the Artificial Intelligence and Cognitive Neuroscience domain. This course offers you the basic knowledge of brain mechanisms to build upon and draw inspiration from in the rest of your career.

In ‘Brain for AI’, the emphasis here will be on acquiring the basic knowledge. Follow-up courses will dive deeper in many of the in-depth applications (e.g., Brain-Computer Interfacing, Cognitive Robotics, Neural Networks, Computational and Formal Modelling). At the end of the course, you sufficiently understand the current knowledge on the human brain to build upon in future courses and your career.

All topics discussed will be connected to the four main questions mentioned.