Events
Neural Algorithms of Speech Comprehension
Laura Gwilliams
Stanford University
Tuesday, April 14, 2026
12:30 p.m.–2 p.m.
Humanities Center, Conference Room D
The goal of my research is to develop a theoretically grounded, biologically constrained and computationally explicit account of how the human brain achieves language comprehension. In my talk, I will present a series of studies that examine neural responses at different spatial scales: From population ensembles using magnetoencephalography and electrocorticography, to the encoding of speech properties in individual neurons across the cortical depth using Neuropixels probes and microelectrodes in humans. The results provide insight into (i) what auditory and linguistic representations serve to bridge between sound and meaning; (ii) what operations reconcile auditory input speed with neural processing time; (iii) how information at different timescales is nested, in time and in space, to allow information exchange across hierarchical structures.