




Joel Zylberberg Laboratory
Computational Neuroscience and Machine Learning
Advancing our understanding of brain function and vision with machine learning and computational models

Joel Zylberberg, Ph.D.
Associate Professor
Department of Ophthalmology
Jules Stein Eye Institute
joelzy@ucla.eduFaculty Profile
Laboratory WebsiteORCID Profile
Dr. Joel Zylberberg is a computational neuroscientist whose work bridges neuroscience and machine learning. His research focuses on understanding how the brain processes information about the world and how those representations are learned. By combining computational modeling with experimental data, Dr. Zylberberg aims to develop bio-inspired machine learning algorithms and improve our understanding of sensory systems like the retina and visual cortex.
Key research questions include:
- How does the brain encode and process sensory information?
- What are the neural mechanisms underlying robust information propagation in noisy circuits?
- How can bio-inspired algorithms improve artificial intelligence systems?
- What are the roles of synaptic plasticity in shaping neural representations?
- How can computational models of vision aid in developing retinal prosthetics?
Dr. Zylberberg's lab employs cutting-edge techniques in computational neuroscience, including deep learning frameworks and information theory, to uncover the principles of brain function and apply them to real-world problems in AI and medicine.

Recent Publications
Finding Shared Decodable Concepts and their Negations in the Brain
Cory Daniel Efird, Alex Murphy, Joel Zylberberg, Alona Fyshe
The Thirteenth International Conference on Learning Representations (2025)
Responses to Pattern-Violating Visual Stimuli Evolve Differently Over Days in Somata and Distal Apical Dendrites
Colleen J. Gillon, Jason E. Pina, Jérôme A. Lecoq, Ruweida Ahmed, Yazan N. Billeh, Shiella Caldejon, Peter Groblewski, Timothy M. Henley, India Kato, Eric Lee, Jennifer Luviano, Kyla Mace, Chelsea Nayan, Thuyanh V. Nguyen, Kat North, Jed Perkins, Sam Seid, Matthew T. Valley, Ali Williford, Yoshua Bengio, Timothy P. Lillicrap, Blake A. Richards, Joel Zylberberg
The Journal of Neuroscience (2024)
View PublicationStimulus type shapes the topology of cellular functional networks in mouse visual cortex
Disheng Tang, Joel Zylberberg, Xiaoxuan Jia, Hannah Choi
Nature Communications (2024)
View PublicationBiophysical neural adaptation mechanisms enable artificial neural networks to capture dynamic retinal computation
Saad Idrees, Michael B. Manookin, Fred Rieke, Greg D. Field, Joel Zylberberg
Nature Communications (2024)
View PublicationFine Granularity Is Critical for Intelligent Neural Network Pruning
Alex Heyman, Joel Zylberberg
Neural Computation (2024)
View PublicationResponses of pyramidal cell somata and apical dendrites in mouse visual cortex over multiple days
Colleen J. Gillon, Jérôme A. Lecoq, Jason E. Pina, Ruweida Ahmed, Yazan N. Billeh, Shiella Caldejon, Peter Groblewski, Timothy M. Henley, India Kato, Eric Lee, Jennifer Luviano, Kyla Mace, Chelsea Nayan, Thuyanh V. Nguyen, Kat North, Jed Perkins, Sam Seid, Matthew T. Valley, Ali Williford, Yoshua Bengio, Timothy P. Lillicrap, Joel Zylberberg, Blake A. Richards
Scientific Data (2023)
View PublicationTowards automated sleep-stage classification for adaptive deep brain stimulation targeting sleep in patients with Parkinson’s disease
Katrina Carver, Karin Saltoun, Elijah Christensen, Aviva Abosch, Joel Zylberberg, John A. Thompson
Communications Engineering (2023)
View PublicationGood decisions require more than information
N. Alex Cayco-Gajic, Joel Zylberberg
Nature Neuroscience (2021)
View PublicationCellular and Synaptic Mechanisms That Differentiate Mitral Cells and Superficial Tufted Cells Into Parallel Output Channels in the Olfactory Bulb
Shelly Jones, Joel Zylberberg, Nathan Schoppa
Frontiers in Cellular Neuroscience (2020)
View PublicationImproved object recognition using neural networks trained to mimic the brain’s statistical properties
Callie Federer, Haoyan Xu, Alona Fyshe, Joel Zylberberg
Neural Networks (2020)
View Publication