Welcome to LEARNMEMTM2023

We are delighted to welcome you to the 2023 INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE ON LEARNING AND MEMORY, LEARNMEM™2023, held against the scenic backdrop of the surf and sand of Huntington Beach, California. The Conference celebrates the 40th Anniversary of the University of California Irvine Center for the Neurobiology of Learning and Memory (CNLM), which was established in 1983 by the UC Regents with James L. McGaugh as its Founding Director.

LEARNMEM™ is more than just a scientific conference. It is a clear statement that no sub-discipline of neuroscience will meet the grand challenge of solving the brain’s mysteries on its own. Cracking the memory code will require an army of brilliant minds from every discipline to work together. LEARNMEM™ celebrates the diversity of our field at every level. Contributions from more then 700 scientists are featured across five days, jam-packed with talks, posters, exhibits, activities, workshops, and of course, a constant supply of caffeine! Remember that symposia allocate 50% of the time for discussion, so please engage and do not be afraid to ask questions and challenge ideas.

In addition to cutting-edge science, LEARNMEM™2023 features several unique activities:

• Featured Research Symposium on the future of the Brain Initiative

• Workshop on scientific communication skills

• Daily lunch professional development and networking activities

• Frontiers for Young Minds Live Review, where children review the work of scientists... Live!

• 80’s Movie Night with a special screening of the 1985 classic Back to the Future

We are very thankful for the tremendous support from government, commercial, and nonprofit partners, without whom it would not have been possible to hold this program. We hope that you will all take the opportunity to visit our exhibitors and build new partnerships and connections. We would also like to extend our deepest gratitude to the Friends of the CNLM, and especially Dr. Renée Harwick, for her generous support of the conference, as well as to the University of California, Irvine’s leadership across several Schools, Departments, and Centers who came together to make this landmark event possible.

We are delighted to once again partner with Frontiers Media, whose leadership and staff have worked with us from the very inception of this conference to make it a reality. To organize and curate the contributions shared at this conference, we are launching a second installement of our special conference-dedicated Frontiers Research Topic. We hope you will consider submitting your work to it, as a means to highlight and converge the most important themes in the field today.

We are deeply indebted to our staff, students, and volunteers who have worked tirelessly to ensure the success of every aspect of the conference. We would like to also thank the LEARNMEM™2023 Program Committee, who worked diligently to critically evaluate the submissions and put together a fantastic program.

We thank you for joining us at LEARNMEM™2023 in Huntington Beach, California and hope that you enjoy the scientific program but also take some time to relax and soak up the sun. Surf’s up!

From the day the University of California, Irvine first opened its doors, neuroscience has been among our towering academic strengths, including the establishment of the first department of neuroscience (at the time called Psychobiology) in the world in 1964 by James McGaugh.

In 1983, McGaugh and colleagues Gary Lynch and Norman Weinberger went on to make history again by creating the first institute in the world dedicated to solving the fundamental challenge of understanding how we learn and remember.

The Center for the Neurobiology of Learning and Memory (CNLM) was established by the University of California Regents as an Organized Research Unit in 1983 with McGaugh as its founding director.

Biologists, engineers, computer scientists, cognitive scientists and psychologists work together at the intersection of disciplines to generate fundamental and often unexpected breakthroughs. This approach has already yielded discoveries that have transformed our understanding of the workings of memory.

From uncovering how emotional arousal strengthens memories to understanding how false memories arise, to revealing the impact of stress, sleep and exercise on memory, to shedding light on how memories are stored in synaptic connections, to discovering a rare and unusual form of superior autobiographical memory, our faculty have been at the forefront of discovery in the field for over 40 years.