ANNOUNCEMENT AND CALL FOR ABSTRACTS Conference on Oscillations in Neural Systems, Sponsored by the Metroplex Institute for Neural Dynamics (MIND) and the University of Texas at Arlington. To be held Thursday through Saturday, MAY 5-7, 1994 Location: UNIVERSITY OF TEXAS AT ARLINGTON MAIN LIBRARY, 6TH FLOOR PARLOR Official Conference Motel: Park Inn 703 Benge Drive Arlington, TX 76013 1-800-777-0100 or 817-860-2323 A block of rooms has been reserved at the Park Inn for $35 a night (single or double). Room sharing arrangements are possible. Reservations should be made directly through the motel. Official Conference Travel Agent: Airline reservations to Dallas-Fort Worth airport should be made through Dan Dipert travel in Arlington, 1-800-443-5335. For those who wish to fly on American Airlines, a Star File account has been set up for a 5% discount off lowest available fares (two week advance, staying over Saturday night) or 10% off regular coach fare; arrangements for Star File reservations should be made through Dan Dipert. Please let the conference organizers know (by e-mail or telephone) when you plan to arrive: some people can be met at the airport (about 30 minutes from Arlington), others can call Super Shuttle at 817-329-2000 upon arrival for transportation to the Park Inn (about $14-$16 per person). Registration for the conference is $25 for students, $65 for non- student oral or poster presenters, $85 for others. MIND members will have $20 (or $10 for students) deducted from the registration. A registration form is attached to this announcement. Registrants will receive the MIND monthly newsletter (on e-mail when possible) for the remainder of 1994. Invited speakers: Bill Baird (University of California, Berkeley) Adi Bulsara (Naval Research Laboratories, San Diego) Alianna Maren (Accurate Automation Corporation) George Mpitsos (Oregon State University) Martin Stemmler (California Institute of Technology) Roger Traub (IBM, Tarrytown, New York) Robert Wong (Downstate Medical Center, Brooklyn) Geoffrey Yuen (Northwestern University) Those interested in presenting are invited to submit abstracts (1-2 paragraphs) any time between now and March 15, 1994, of any work related to the theme of the conference. The topic of neural oscillation is currently of great interest to psychologists and neuroscientists alike. Recently it has been observed that neurons in separate areas of the brain will oscillate in synchrony in response to certain stimuli. One hypothesized function for such synchronized oscillations is to solve the "binding problem," that is, how is it that disparate features of objects (e.g., a person's face and their voice) are tied together into a single unitary whole. Some bold speculators (such as Francis Crick in his recent book, The Astonishing Hypothesis) even argue that synchronized neural oscillations form the basis for consciousness. Talks will be 1 hour for invited speakers and 45 minutes for contributed speakers including questions. There will be no parallel sessors. Contributors whose work is considered worthy of presentation but who cannot be fit into the schedule will be invited to present posters. Presenters will not be required to write complete papers. After the conference is over, we will attempt to obtain a contract with a publisher for a book based on the conference. Oral and poster presenters will be invited to submit chapters to this book, although it is not a precondition for being a speaker. Two books based on previous MIND conferences (Motivation, Emotion, and Goal Direction in Neural Networks and Neural Networks for Knowledge Representation and Inference) have been published by Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, and a book based on our last conference (Optimality in Biological and Artificial Networks?) is now in progress, under contract with Erlbaum as part of their joint series with INNS. Abstracts should submitted, by e-mail, snail mail, or fax, to: Professor Daniel S. Levine Department of Mathematics, University of Texas at Arlington 411 S. Nedderman Drive Arlington, TX 76019-0408 Office telephone: 817-273-3598, fax: 817-794-5802 e-mail: b344dsl@utarlg.uta.edu Further inquiries about the conference can be addressed to Professor Levine or to the other two conference organizers: Professor Vincent Brown Mr. Timothy Shirey 817-273-3247 214-495-3500 or 214-422-4570 b096vrb@utarlg.uta.edu 73353.3524@compuserve.com Please distribute this announcement to anyone you think may be interested in the conference. REGISTRATION FOR MIND/INNS CONFERENCE ON OSCILLATIONS IN NEURAL SYSTEMS, UNIVERSITY OF TEXAS AT ARLINGTON, MAY 5-7, 1994 Name ______________________________________________________________ Address ___________________________________________________________ ___________________________________________________________ ___________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________ E-Mail __________________________________________________________ Telephone _________________________________________________________ Registration fee enclosed: _____ $15 Student, member of MIND _____ $25 Student _____ $65 Non-student oral or poster presenter _____ $65 Non-student member of MIND _____ $85 All others Will you be staying at the Park Inn? ____ Yes ____ No Are you planning to share a room with someone you know? ____ Yes ____ No If so, please list that person's name __________________________ If not, would be you be interested in sharing a room with another conference attendee to be assigned? ____ Yes ____ No PLEASE REMEMBER TO CALL THE PARK INN DIRECTLY FOR YOUR RESERVATION (WHETHER SINGLE OR DOUBLE) AT 1-800-777-0100 OR 817-860-2323.