Staff Profile
Professor Alexander Thiele
Professor of Visual Neuroscience
- Email: alex.thiele@ncl.ac.uk
- Telephone: +44 (0) 191 208 7564
- Personal Website: http://www.staff.ncl.ac.uk/alex.thiele
- Address: Biosciences Institute
Henry Wellcome Building for Neuroecology
Newcastle University,
Framlington Place,
Newcastle upon Tyne
NE2 4HH
Research Interests
Key words: Visual Neuroscience, Cognitive Neuroscience ,Neuropharmacology, Attention, Decision making, Neural coding
My work focusses on neuronal and sensory coding, and the analysis of cognitive function in relation to neuropharmacology. I lead a multidisciplinary team, using a variety of different animal models, as well as human subjects, to understand mechanisms of cognition in relation to sensory processing.
Work in my lab spans multiple areas including: basic aspects of vision and audition and how this is facilitated by temporal coding, and by intra-areal and interareal communication as well as mechanisms of learning, attention and decision making. A key driving question is unravelling the underlying neuropharmacology that enables these processes.
I exploit multiple techniques to address these topics, including humans and non-human primate fMRI, multi-electrode single cell recordings in non-human primate, 2-photon Ca imaging, and optogenetics, all combined with neuropharmacological manipulations.
- van Kempen J, Loughnane GM, Newmann DP, Kelly SP, Thiele A, Bellgrove MA. Behavioural and neural signatures of perceptual decision-making are modulated by pupil-linked arousal. eLife 2019, 8, e42541.
- Dasila M, Brandt C, Gotthardt S, Gieselmann MA, Distler C, Thiele A. Cell Class specific modulation of attentional signals by acetylcholine in macaque frontal eye field. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 2019, 116(40), 20180-20189.
- Gray H, Thiele A, Rowe C. Using preferred fluids and different reward schedules to motivate rhesus macaques (Macaca mulatta) in cognitive tasks. Laboratory Animals 2019, 53(4), 372-382.
- Milham MP, Ai L, Koo B, Xu T, Amiez C, Balezeau F, Baxter MG, Blezer ELA, Brochier T, Chen A, Croxson PL, Damatac CG, Dehaene S, Everling S, Fair DA, Fleysher L, Freiwald W, Froudist-Walsh S, Griffiths TD, Guedj C, Hadj-Bouziane F, Ben Hamed S, Harel N, Hiba B, Jarraya B, Jung B, Kastner S, Klink PC, Kwok SC, Laland KN, Leopold DA, Lindenfors P, Mars RB, Menon RS, Messinger A, Meunier M, Mok K, Morrison JH, Nacef J, Nagy J, Ortiz-Rios M, Petkov CI, Pinsk M, Poirier C, Procyk E, Rajimehr R, Reader S, Roelfsema P, Rudko DA, Rushworth MFS, Russ BE, Sallet J, Schmid MC, Schwiedrzik CM, Seidlitz J, Sein J, Shmuel A, Sullivan EL, Ungerleider L, Thiele A, Todorov OS, Tsao D, Wang Z, Wilson CRE, Yacoub E, Ye FQ, Zarco W, Zhou Y, Margulies DS, Schroeder CES. An Open Resource for Non-human Primate Imaging. Neuron 2018, 100(1), 61-74.
- Schneider F, Dheerendra P, Balezeau F, Ortiz-Rios M, Kikuchi Y, Petkov CI, Thiele A, Griffiths TD. Auditory figure-ground analysis in rostral belt and parabelt of the macaque monkey. Scientific Reports 2018, 8, 17948.
- Mitchell AS, Thiele A, Petkov CI, Roberts A, Robbins TW, Schultz W, Lemon R. Continued need for non-human primate neuroscience research. Current Biology 2018, 28(20), R1186-R1187.
- Ortiz-Rios M, Haag M, Balezeau F, Frey S, Thiele A, Murphy K, Schmid MC. Improved methods for MRI-compatible implants in nonhuman primates. Journal of Neuroscience Methods 2018, 308, 377-389.
- Thiele A, Bellgrove MA. Neuromodulation of Attention. Neuron 2018, 97(4), 769–785.
- Sanayei M, Chen X, Chicharro D, Distler C, Panzeri S, Thiele A. Perceptual learning of fine contrast discrimination changes neuronal tuning and population coding in macaque V4. Nature Communications 2018, 9, 4238.
- Poirier C, Baumann S, Dheerendra P, Joly O, Hunter D, Balezeau F, Sun L, Rees A, Petkov CI, Thiele A, Griffiths TD. Auditory motion-specific mechanisms in the primate brain. PLoS Biology 2017, 15(5), 1-24.
- van Kempen J, Panzeri S, Thiele A. Cholinergic Control of Information Coding. Trends in Neurosciences 2017, 40(9), 522-524.
- Herrero JL, Gieselmann MA, Thiele A. Muscarinic and nicotinic contribution to contrast sensitivity of macaque area V1 neurons. Frontiers in Neural Circuits 2017, 11, 106.
- Savage MA, McQuade R, Thiele A. Segregated fronto-cortical and midbrain connections in the mouse and their relation to approach and avoidance orienting behaviors. Journal of Comparative Neurology 2017, 525(8), 1980-1999.
- Gray H, Pearce B, Thiele A, Rowe C. The use of preferred social stimuli as rewards for rhesus macaques in behavioural neuroscience. PLoS ONE 2017, 12(5), e0178048.
- Thiele A, Brandt C, Dasilva M, Gotthardt S, Chicharro D, Panzeri S, Distler C. Attention Induced Gain Stabilization in Broad and Narrow-Spiking Cells in the Frontal Eye-Field of Macaque Monkeys. Journal of Neuroscience 2016, 36(29), 7601-7612.
- Slater H, Milne AE, Wilson B, Muers RS, Balezeau F, Hunter D, Thiele A, Griffiths TD, Petkov CI. Individually customisable non-invasive head immobilisation system for non-human primates with an option for voluntary engagement. Journal of Neuroscience Methods 2016, 269, 46-60.
- Engel TA, Steinmetz NA, Gieselmann MA, Thiele A, Moore T, Boahen K. Selective modulation of cortical state during spatial attention. Science 2016, 354(6316), 1140-1144.
- Sanayei M, Herrero JL, Distler C, Thiele A. Attention and normalization circuits in macaque V1. European Journal of Neuroscience 2015, 41(7), 949-964.
- Wilson B, Kikuchi Y, Sun L, Hunter D, Dick F, Smith K, Thiele A, Griffiths TD, Marslen-Wilson WD, Petkov CI. Auditory sequence processing reveals evolutionarily conserved regions of frontal cortex in macaques and humans. Nature Communications 2015, 6, 8901.
- Connolly JD, Vuong QC, Thiele A. Gaze-Dependent Topography in Human Posterior Parietal Cortex. Cerebral Cortex 2015, 25(6), 1519-1526.
- Baumann S, Joly O, Rees A, Petkov CI, Sun L, Thiele A, Griffiths TD. The Topography of Frequency and Time Representation in Primate Auditory Cortices. eLife 2015, 4, e03256.
- Tomsett RJ, Ainsworth M, Thiele A, Sanayei M, Chen X, Gieselmann MA, Whittington MA, Cunningham MO, Kaiser M. Virtual Electrode Recording Tool for EXtracellular potentials (VERTEX): comparing multi-electrode recordings from simulated and biological mammalian cortical tissue. Brain Structure and Function 2015, 220(4), 2333-2353.
- Joly O, Baumann S, Poirier C, Patterson RD, Thiele A, Griffiths TD. A perceptual pitch boundary in a non-human primate. Frontiers in Psychology 2014, 5, 998.
- Joly O, Baumann S, Balezeau F, Thiele A, Griffiths TD. Merging functional and structural properties of the monkey auditory cortex. Frontiers in Neuroscience 2014, 8, 198.
- Chen X, Sanayei M, Thiele A. Stimulus Roving and Flankers Affect Perceptual Learning of Contrast Discrimination in Macaca mulatta. PLoS ONE 2014, 9(10), e109604.
- Herrero JL, Gieselmann MA, Sanayei M, Thiele A. Attention-Induced Variance and Noise Correlation Reduction in Macaque V1 Is Mediated by NMDA Receptors. Neuron 2013, 78(4), 729-739.
- Thiele A. Muscarinic signaling in the brain. Annual Review of Neuroscience 2013, 36, 271-294.
- Chen X, Sanayei M, Thiele A. Perceptual learning of contrast discrimination in macaca mulatta. Journal of Vision 2013, 13(13), 22.
- Ponce-Alvarez A, Thiele A, Albright TD, Stoner GR, Deco G. Stimulus-dependent variability and noise correlations in cortical MT neurons. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 2013, 110(32), 13162-13167.
- Thiele A, Herrero JL, Distler C, Hoffmann KP. Contribution of Cholinergic and GABAergic Mechanisms to Direction Tuning, Discriminability, Response Reliability, and Neuronal Rate Correlations in Macaque Middle Temporal Area. Journal of Neuroscience 2012, 32(47), 16602-16615.
- Chen X, Hoffmann KP, Albright TD, Thiele A. Effect of feature-selective attention on neuronal responses in macaque area MT. Journal of Neurophysiology 2012, 107(5), 1530-1543.
- Thiele A. NMDA receptors figure it out. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America 2012, 109(27), 10749-10750.
- Thiele A. Stay focussed - muffle that resonant bass!. Trends in Cognitive Sciences 2012, 16(4), 194-195.
- Deco G, Thiele A. Cholinergic control of cortical network interactions enables feedback-mediated attentional modulation. European Journal of Neuroscience 2011, 34(1), 146-157.
- Harris KD, Thiele A. Cortical state and attention. Nature Reviews. Neuroscience 2011, 12(9), 509 - 523.
- Vuksanovic V, Bartolo M, Hunter D, Sun L, Thiele A. fMRI based Granger causality as a measure of effective connectivity in macaque visual cortex. In: BC11: Computational Neuroscience & Neurotechnology Bernstein Conference & Neurex Annual Meeting 2011. 2011, Freiburg, Germany: Frontiers Media S.A.
- Baumann S, Griffiths TD, Sun L, Petkov CI, Thiele A, Rees A. Orthogonal representation of sound dimensions in the primate midbrain. Nature Neuroscience 2011, 14(4), 423-425.
- Bartolo MJ, Gieselmann MA, Vuksanovic V, Hunter D, Sun L, Chen X, Delicato LS, Thiele A. Stimulus-induced dissociation of neuronal firing rates and local field potential gamma power and its relationship to the blood oxygen level-dependent signal in macaque primary visual cortex. European Journal of Neuroscience 2011, 34(11), 1857-1870.
- Chalk M, Herrero JL, Gieselmann MA, Delicato LS, Gotthardt S, Thiele A. Attention Reduces Stimulus-Driven Gamma Frequency Oscillations and Spike Field Coherence in V1. Neuron 2010, 66(1), 114-125.
- Baumann S, Griffiths TD, Rees A, Hunter D, Sun L, Thiele A. Characterisation of the BOLD response time course at different levels of the auditory pathway in non-human primates. NeuroImage 2010, 50(3), 1099-1108.
- Pooresmaeili A, Poort J, Thiele A, Roelfsema PR. Separable Codes for Attention and Luminance Contrast in the Primary Visual Cortex. Journal of Neuroscience 2010, 30(38), 12701-12711.
- Pooresmaeili A, Herrero JL, Self MW, Roelfsema PR, Thiele A. Suppressive Lateral Interactions at Parafoveal Representations in Primary Visual Cortex. Journal of Neuroscience 2010, 30(38), 12745-12758.
- Thiele A, Pooresmaeili A, Delicato LS, Herrero JL, Roelfsema PR. Additive Effects of Attention and Stimulus Contrast in Primary Visual Cortex. Cerebral Cortex 2009, 19(12), 2970-2981.
- Deco G, Thiele A. Attention - oscillations and neuropharmacology. European Journal of Neuroscience 2009, 30(3), 347-354.
- Thiele A. Optimizing brain processing. Nature Neuroscience 2009, 12(11), 1359-1360.
- Herrero JL, Roberts MJ, Delicato LS, Gieselmann MA, Dayan P, Thiele A. Acetylcholine contributes through muscarinic receptors to attentional modulation in V1. Nature 2008, 454(7208), 1110-1114.
- Roberts MJ, Thiele A. Attention and contrast differently affect contextual integration in an orientation discrimination task. Experimental Brain Research 2008, 187(4), 535-549.
- Gieselmann MA, Thiele A. Comparison of spatial integration and surround suppression characteristics in spiking activity and the local field potential in macaque V1. European Journal of Neuroscience 2008, 28(3), 447-459.
- Thiele A, Roberts M. Mechanisms of Spatial Integration in Primary Visual Cortex of the Primate. In: Advances in Cognitive Neurodynamics ICCN 2007: Proceedings of the 1st International Conference on Cognitive Neurodynamics. 2008, Shanghai, China: Springer.
- Thiele A, Hoffmann K-P. Neuronal firing rate, inter-neuron correlation and synchrony in area MT are correlated with directional choices during stimulus and reward expectation. Experimental Brain Research 2008, 188(4), 559-577.
- Roberts MJ, Thiele A. Spatial integration and its moderation by attention and acetylcholine. Frontiers in Bioscience 2008, 13(10), 3742-3759.
- Roberts M, Delicato LS, Herrero J, Gieselmann MA, Thiele A. Attention alters spatial integration in macaque V1 in an eccentricity-dependent manner. Nature Neuroscience 2007, 10(11), 1483-1491.
- Thiele A. Reconstructing the World: Switching from Segmentation to Integration Allows Neurons in Area MT to Make "Sense" of the Visual Scene. Neuron 2007, 53(5), 623-625.
- Guo K, Robertson RG, Pulgarin M, Nevado A, Panzeri S, Thiele A, Young MP. Spatio-temporal prediction and inference by V1 neurons. European Journal of Neuroscience 2007, 26(4), 1045-1054.
- Thiele A, Delicato LS, Roberts MJ, Gieselmann MA. A novel electrode-pipette design for simultaneous recording of extracellular spikes and iontophoretic drug application in awake behaving monkeys. Journal of Neuroscience Methods 2006, 158(2), 207-211.
- Zinke W, Roberts MJ, Guo K, McDonald JS, Robertson R, Thiele A. Cholinergic modulation of response properties and orientation tuning of neurons in primary visual cortex of anaesthetized Marmoset monkeys. European Journal of Neuroscience 2006, 24(1), 314-328.
- Delicato LS, Hunter D, Sun L, Thiele A. Contrast-dependent spatial integration in awake macaque V1 measured by fMRI. In: Neuroscience 2006. 2006, Atlanta, Georgia: Society for Neuroscience.
- Thiele A, Stoner G, Delicato LS, Roberts M. Roles of synchronized neuronal activities in perception. In: 29th Annual Meeting of the Japan Neuroscience Society. 2006, Kyoto, Japan: Neuroscience Research: Elsevier.
- Roberts MJ, Zinke W, Guo K, Robertson R, McDonald JS, Thiele A. Acetylcholine dynamically controls spatial integration in marmoset primary visual cortex. Journal of Neurophysiology 2005, 93(4), 2062-2072.
- Thiele A, Roberts M, Delicato L, Dayan P. Cholinergic contribution to attentional effects in V1 neurons of the macaque monkey. In: Society for Neuroscience (SFN). 2005, Washington, DC, USA.
- Riecansky I, Thiele A, Distler C, Hoffmann K-P. Chromatic sensitivity of neurones in area MT of the anaesthetised macaque monkey compared to human motion perception. Experimental Brain Research 2005, 167(4), 504-525.
- Pola G, Petersen RS, Thiele A, Young MP, Panzeri S. Data-robust tight lower bounds to the information carried by spike times of a neuronal population. Neural Computation 2005, 17(9), 1962-2005.
- Delicato L, Roberts M, Thiele A. Effects of attention on orientation-tuning and contrast response functions in primate V1. In: Society for Neuroscience (SFN). 2005, Washington, DC, USA.
- Thiele A. Vision: A brake on the speed of sight. Current Biology 2005, 15(22), R917-R919.
- Roberts M, Thiele A. Attention reduces spatial integration in primate primary visual cortex. In: Society for Neurosciences Spring Conference. 2004, San Diego, California, USA.
- Thiele A, Distler C, Korbmacher H, Hoffmann K-P. Contribution of inhibitory mechanisms to direction selectivity and response normalization in macaque middle temporal area. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America 2004, 101(26), 9810-9815.
- Thiele A, Distler C, Korbmacher H, Hoffmann K-P. Contribution of inhibitory mechanisms to direction selectivity and response normalization in macaque middle temporal area. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 2004, 101(26), 9810-9815.
- Guo K, Nevado A, Robertson RG, Pulgarin M, Thiele A, Young MP. Effects on orientation perception of manipulating the spatio-temporal prior probability of stimuli. Vision Research 2004, 44(20), 2349-2358.
- Thiele A. Perceptual learning: Is V1 up to the task?. Current Biology 2004, 14(16), R671-R673.
- Pola G, Thiele A, Hoffmann K-P, Panzeri S. An exact method to quantify the information content of neuronal correlations. Network: Computation in Neural Systems 2003, 14(1), 35-60.
- Pola G, Thiele A, Hoffmann K-P, Panzeri S. An exact method to quantify the information transmitted by different mechanisms of correlational coding. Network: Computation in Neural Systems 2003, 14(1), 35-60.
- Roberts M, Zinke W, MacDonald S, Robertson R, Guo K, Thiele A. Effects of Acetylcholine on Length Integration in Primary Visual Cortex. In: 34th Annual Meeting of the Society for Neuroscience. 2003, New Orleans, Lousiana, USA.
- Thiele A, Stoner G. Neuronal synchrony does not correlate with motion coherence in cortical area MT. Nature 2003, 421(6921), 366-370.
- Perrone JA, Thiele A. A model of speed tuning in MT neurons. Vision Research 2002, 42(8), 1035-1051.
- Thiele A. Attention reduces the impact of prior spatiotemporal information on perceptual judgments. Perception 2002, 31(supplement), 76-76.
- Thiele A, Rezec A, Dobkins KR. Chromatic input to motion processing in the absence of attention. Vision Research 2002, 42(11), 1395-1401.
- Hoffmann KP, Bremmer F, Thiele A, Distler C. Directional asymmetry of neurons in cortical areas MT and MST projecting to the NOT-DTN in macaques. Journal of Neurophysiology 2002, 87(4), 2113-2123.
- Thiele A, Henning P, Kubischik M, Hoffmann KP. Neural Mechanisms of Saccadic Suppression. Science 2002, 295(5564), 2460-2462.
- Thiele A, Albright TD, Hoffmann KP. Effects of feature selective attention on neuronal responses in macaque area MT. Soc. Neurosci. Abstr 2001, 31, 722.2.
- Thiele A, Hoffmann KP, Albright TD. Effects of feature-selective attention on neuronal responses in macaque area MT. In: PERCEPTION. 2001, 207 BRONDESBURY PARK, LONDON NW2 5JN, ENGLAND: PION LTD.
- Thiele A, Dobkins KR, Albright TD. Neural correlates of chromatic motion perception. Neuron 2001, 32(2), 351-358.
- Perrone JA, Thiele A. Speed skills: Measuring the visual speed analyzing properties of primate MT neurons. Nature Neuroscience 2001, 4(5), 526-532.
- Dobkins KR, Thiele A, Albright TD. Comparison of red-green equiluminance points in humans and macaques: evidence for different L:M cone ratios between species. Journal of the Optical Society of America (JOSA A) 2000, 17(3), 545-56.
- Thiele A, Dobkins KR, Albright TD. Neural correlates of contrast detection at threshold. Neuron 2000, 26(3), 715-724.
- Thiele A, Distler C, Hoffmann KP. Decision-related activity in the macaque dorsal visual pathway. European Journal of Neuroscience 1999, 11(6), 2044-2058.
- Thiele A, Dobkins KR, Albright TD. The contribution of color to motion processing in Macaque middle temporal area. Journal of Neuroscience 1999, 19(15), 6571-6587.
- A. Thiele,K.R. Dobkins,T.D. Albright. The contribution of color to motion processing in macaque area MT. Proc.Soc.Neurosci 1998, 24.
- F. Bremmer,U. J. Ilg,A. Thiele,C. Distler,K. P. Hoffmann. Eye position effects in monkey cortex. I. Visual and pursuit-related activity in extrastriate areas MT and MST. J Neurophysiol 1997, 77(2), 944-61.
- S. C. de Oliveira,A. Thiele,K. P. Hoffmann. Synchronization of neuronal activity during stimulus expectation in a direction discrimination task. J Neurosci 1997, 17(23), 9248-60.
- A. Thiele,F. Bremmer,U.J. Ilg,K.P. Hoffmann. Visual responses of neurons from areas V1 and MT in a monkey with late onset strabismus: A case study. Vision Res 1997, 37, 853-863.
- A. Thiele,R. Rubsamen,K. P. Hoffmann. Anatomical and physiological investigation of auditory input to the superior colliculus of the echolocating megachiropteran bat Rousettus aegyptiacus. Exp Brain Res 1996, 112(2), 223-36.
- L. Schlykowa,K. P. Hoffmann,F. Bremmer,A. Thiele,W. H. Ehrenstein. Monkey saccadic latency and pursuit velocity show a preference for upward directions of target motion. Neuroreport 1996, 7(2), 409-12.
- Thiele A, Hoffmann KP. Neuronal activity in MST and STPp, but not MT changes systematically with stimulus-independent decisions. Neuroreport 1996, 7(5), 971-976.
- M. Pekel,M. Lappe,F. Bremmer,A. Thiele,K. P. Hoffmann. Neuronal responses in the motion pathway of the macaque monkey to natural optic flow stimuli. Neuroreport 1996, 7(4), 884-8.
- M. Lappe,F. Bremmer,M. Pekel,A. Thiele,K.P. Hoffmann. Optic flow processing in monkey STS: A theoretical and experimental approach. Journal of Neuroscience 1996, 16, 6265-6285.
- A. Thiele,M. Vogelsang,K. P. Hoffmann. Pattern of retinotectal projection in the megachiropteran bat Rousettus aegyptiacus. J Comp Neurol 1991, 314(4), 671-83.