The Brain’s GPS: How We Know Where We Are

Name: The Brain’s GPS: How We Know Where We Are
Start: 2026-03-27T16:00:00+08:00
Location: 研究院路二段128號 、 Taipei, Taiwan 11529

Schedule

Fri, 27 Mar, 2026 at 04:00 pm

UTC+08:00

Location

研究院路二段128號、 Taipei, Taiwan 11529 | Taipei, TP

(Event details in English below.)
「臺灣橋梁計畫」諾貝爾獎得主系列講座「大腦的GPS：我們如何知道自己身在何處？」
📌主持人：廖俊智（中央研究院院長）
📌主講人：愛德華．莫澤博士 (2014年諾貝爾生理學或醫學獎得主)
📌報名連結：https://forms.gle/WCcDYFRwzDnFSDuq8
📌地點：本院生物醫學科學研究所B1C演講廳
📌地址：臺北市南港區研究院路二段128號
*本活動全程以英文進行，現場提供即時中文字幕。
📌演講摘要：
本演講將聚焦於哺乳類大腦如何編碼空間與時間。在所有腦功能中，幾乎沒有什麼比組織與理解空間與時間的能力更攸關生存。莫澤教授將先從獲得諾貝爾獎的空間研究發現談起。在哺乳類大腦的內嗅皮質中，存在一些專門負責位置編碼的細胞類型，其中包括網格細胞。網格細胞只會在動物（以及人類）處於特定位置時被激活，而這些位置在環境中會形成一種週期性的六角形網格排列。網格細胞能夠與內嗅區域中的其他專門細胞類型，共同建立出一種類似 GPS 的動態地圖，幫助我們定位自己在環境中的位置。
在演講的第二部分，莫澤教授將轉向時間的編碼，說明我們如何從內嗅皮質另一個區域中多個細胞的共同活動推斷出時間。這項研究顯示，整個大腦系統可能是為了同時編碼經驗中的「何地」與「何時」而演化與適應的。這也符合目前普遍的觀點：內嗅系統功能的缺損是某些神經疾病的核心原因之一，在這些疾病中，人們會出現空間與時間定向能力的障礙，例如阿茲海默症便是。

The Brain’s GPS: How We Know Where We Are
📌TAIWAN BRIDGES Lecture by Nobel Laureate Dr. Edvard I. Moser (2014 Nobel Laureate in Physiology or Medicine)
📌Host: Dr. James C. Liao, President of Academia Sinica
📌Registration: https://forms.gle/WCcDYFRwzDnFSDuq8
📌Venue: Auditorium B1C, Institute of Biomedical Sciences, Academia Sinica
*This lecture will be given in English.

📌Lecture Synopsis:
This lecture will focus on how the mammalian brain encodes space and time. Few brain functions are more critical to survival than the ability to organize space and time. Professor Moser will begin with the Nobel-awarded discoveries on space. The entorhinal cortex of the mammalian brain contains specialized position-coding cell types, including grid cells. Grid cells are active only when animals (and humans) are at certain locations, locations that tile environments in a periodic hexagonal pattern. Together with other specialized cell types in the entorhinal region, grid cells enable a dynamic GPS-like map of our own location in the environment.

In the second part of the lecture Professor Moser will switch to time and show how time can be inferred from the joint activity of cells in a different region of the entorhinal cortex, suggesting that this entire brain system is adapted for encoding both the wheres and the whens of experience, in agreement with the now common view that deficits in the function of the entorhinal system are at the core of neurological diseases where orientation in space and time is affected, such as in Alzheimer’s disease.