Yesterday we had the privilege to attend a talk by Prof. Fernando Maestú, Director of the Laboratory of Cognitive and Computational Neuroscience of the Center for Biomedical Technology of Madrid, who was invited by the EvoCog Group within the program of the PhD in Evolution and Cognition.

Prof. Fernando Maestú, Director of the Laboratory of Cognitive and Computational Neuroscience, Madrid.

Prof. Maestú gave an outstanding and very stimulating overview of the principles and usefulness of magnetoencephalography (MEG) to study cognitive functions, from language to executive functions, and neurological diseases (e.g., Alzheimer's disease). The talk covered several lines of investigation showing how brain and mental function intertwine, how neuropsychological rehabilitation modifies the connectivity of the brain, how culture influences the organization of its functional areas, how cognition and its behavioral manifestations are best understood when taking into account the functional dynamics of brain activity. While a lot of effort has typically been spent on identifying brain areas active in certain tasks, the work presented yesterday by Prof. Maestú shows how the connectivity measured at rest provides crucial keys to understand cognition or to predict cognitive decline in old age. An outstanding talk making state-of-the-art science accessible and very stimulating, spanning from the fundamental principles of MEG to important theoretical and practical (e.g., health) implications.