This teaching unit belongs to the program of the Graduate School Neuro3P of the ITI NeuroStra. It is mandatory for NeuroTime students, but is also available as optional unit to other NCI, NCO and JMN students.
Objective: To understand and handle the basic concepts of time in Neurosciences
Summary: Sensing environmental changes and encoding time to adapt to them is a question of survival, from cyanobacteria to humans. Following an introductive class on time and time-associated concepts, the teaching unit spreads in four parts. First, the course focuses on the concepts of biological clock and clock genes, daily and seasonal biological rhythms, mechanisms of synchronization, and the acute and chronic health effects of disrupted clocks. The second part explains how timing shapes in human brain, using models to understand the mechanisms underlying time prediction (single and multimodal ones). The third one develops the neural basis of timing with time scales from the milliseconds to seconds, which are essential to discriminate temporal sequences, adjust behaviour or become memory. Accordingly, the fourth part is a journey through memory engrams in order to apprehend the way brain keeps information from milliseconds to a lifelong time.
 

Macro skill: “Master the scientific method”
* Achieve knowledge synthesis and compare information with relevant bibliography, justify a scientific question (E)
*Observe and describe results, items, facts with a critical approach (E)
*Objects analysis : relate data, identify causality versus correlation in the observed facts (E)

Macro skill : « Carry out a project »
*Master techniques and tools in the disciplinary field (A)
*Autonomy and team work (A)
*Time management (A)

Macro skill : « Communicate »
*Master communication tools (E)
*Ability to explain, justify, illustrate one’s data/project either with a written report or a talk (E)