Benjamin A. Rowland, PhD

Assistant Professor

Education

University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
University of Louisiana at Lafayette

Research

My general interests are in understanding how the brain combines multiple sources of information in making decisions. Because many decisions in daily life are made effortlessly (e.g., object recognition), we often take their complexity for granted. Nonetheless, such decisions are only possible after an extensive amount of computation, requiring the fusion of information both within and across multiple sensory modalities. Multisensory integration is an excellent model system, because the sources of information can be studied independently, and thus the specific benefit of their fusion can be rigorously assessed.

Selected Publications

Jiang, W., Jiang, H., Rowland, B.A., & Stein, B.E. (2007). Multisensory orientation behavior is disrupted by neonatal cortical ablation. Journal of Neurophysiology. In press.

Rowland, B.A., Stanford, T.R., & Stein, B.E. (2007). A model of the neural mechanisms underlying multisensory integration in the superior colliculus. Journal of Perception. In press.

Rowland, B.A., Stanford, T.R., & Stein, B.E. (2007). A Bayesian model unifies multisensory spatial localization with the physiological properties of the superior colliculus. Behavioral Brain Research. In press.

Rowland, B.A., Quessy, S., Stanford, T.R., & Stein, B.E. (2007). Multisensory integration shortens physiological response latencies. Journal of Neuroscience. In press.

Stein, B.E., Rowland, B.A., Laurienti, P., & Stanford, T.R. (2007). Sensorimotor integration: Multisensory convergence and integration. In: New Encyclopedia of Neuroscience (R. Krauzulis, ed.), Elsevier. In press.

Rowland, B.A., Jiang, W., & Stein, B.E. (2007). Cortical afferents of the superior colliculus guide the development of multisensory integration in visual localization. Proceedings of 2007 Meeting of the Association for Research in Vision and Opthalmology, Fort Lauderdale, FL.

Rowland, B.A., Maida, A.S., & Berkeley, I.S.N. (2006). Synaptic noise as a means of implementing weight-perturbation learning. Connection Science, 18(1), 69-79.

Gingras, G., Rowland, B.A., & Stein, B.E. (2006). Unisensory versus multisensory integration: Computational distinctions in behavior. Society for Neuroscience Abstracts, 2006. Atlanta, GA.

Rowland, B.A., Quessy, S., Stanford, T.R., & Stein, B.E. (2006). Timing: a critical factor in multisensory integration. Proceedings of the 6th Annual International Multisensory Research Forum. Dublin, Ireland.

Rowland, B.A., Stanford, T.R., & Stein, B.E. (2006). Computational modeling of multisensory neurons in the superior colliculus. Society for Neuroscience Abstracts, 2006. Atlanta, GA.

Gingras, G., Rowland, B.A., & Stein, B.E. (2006). The difference between within-modal and cross-modal integration: A Bayesian explanation. Proceedings of 2006 Meeting of the Association for Research in Vision and Opthalmology, Fort Lauderdale, FL.

Gingras, G., Rowland, B.A., & Stein, B.E. (2006). Behavioral assessment of unisensory and multisensory integration. . Proceedings of the 2006 Meeting of the Vision Sciences Society, Sarasota, FL.

Rowland, B.A., Jiang, W., & Stein, B.E. (2005). Long-term plasticity in multisensory integration. Society for Neuroscience Abstracts, 2005. Washington, D.C.
Stanford, T.R., Rowland, B.A., & Stein, B.E. (2005). Modeling multisensory enhancement in the superior colliculus. Proceedings of the 5th Annual International Multisensory Research Forum, 2005. Trento, Italy.

Stein, B.E., Rowland, B.A., & Stanford, T.R. (2005). Multisensory enhancement by spatially disparate nontargets in the periphery: A Bayesian explanation. Society for Neuroscience Abstracts, 2005. Washington, D.C.

Rowland, B.A. & Maida, A.S. (2004). Spatiotemporal novelty detection using resonance networks. Proceedings of the Florida Artificial Intelligence Research Symposium. Miami Beach, FL.

Rowland, B.A. & Maida, A.S. (2003). The temporal segmentation capacity of integrate and fire networks with transmission delays. Proceedings of the 7th Annual International Conference on Cognitive and Neural Systems, 2003. Boston, MA.

Maida, A.S., Rowland, B.A., & Gunay, C. (2001). Simulations of planar integrate-and-fire networks with delays and refractory periods. Proceedings of the 5th International Conference on Cognitive and Neural Systems, 2001. Boston, MA.

Maida, A.S. & Rowland, B.A. (2001). Synchronized firing in a time-delayed neural network. Proceedings of the Florida Artificial Intelligence Research Symposium. Miami Beach, FL.

Maida, A.S., Gunay, C., & Rowland, B.A. (2001). Simulation of planar I/F networks with delayed connections. Proceedings of the International Joint INNS-IEEE Conference on Neural Networks, 2001. Washington, D.C.