Ben Seymour

BSc MB ChB PhD MRCP FRSA

Professor of Clinical Neuroscience

Wellcome Senior Fellow
Consultant Neurologist

Pain and aversive learning, with a focus on computational neuroscience and neurotechnology

Pain and aversive learning

My lab addresses the computational and systems neuroscience of pain. This research is part theoretical: building realistic models of neuronal information processes to understand processes of pain perception and behaviour, and part experimental: testing these theories using a range of experimental methodologies, especially fMRI. My research aims to develop new technology-based therapies for treating pain in clinical populations.

I am a Wellcome Senior Clinical Fellow at Oxford University, working jointly at the Wellcome Centre for Integrative Neuroimaging and the Oxford Institute for Biomedical Engineering; and a visiting researcher at the National institute of Information and Communications Technology in Osaka, and ATR labs (Kyoto). I am also an honorary consultant neurologist at Oxford University Hospitals NHS Trust with an interest in behavioural homeostasis and sleep neurology.

Key publications

Pain Control by Co-adaptive Learning in a Brain-Machine Interface.
Journal article

Zhang S. et al, (2020), Curr Biol
Pain: A Precision Signal for Reinforcement Learning and Control
Journal article

Seymour B., (2019), Neuron, 101, 1029 - 1041
The control of tonic pain by active relief learning
Journal article

Zhang S. et al, (2017)
Fear reduction without fear through reinforcement of neural activity that bypasses conscious exposure
Journal article

Koizumi A. et al, (2017), Nature Human Behaviour, 1

Recent publications

Learning the statistics of pain: computational and neural mechanisms
Mancini F. et al, (2021)
Learning the statistics of pain: computational and neural mechanisms
Mancini F. et al, (2021)
A multi-site, multi-disorder resting-state magnetic resonance image database.
Journal article

Tanaka SC. et al, (2021), Sci Data, 8
Primary functional brain connections associated with melancholic major depressive disorder and modulation by antidepressants
Journal article

Ichikawa N. et al, (2020), Scientific Reports, 10
Publisher Correction: Primary functional brain connections associated with melancholic major depressive disorder and modulation by antidepressants (Scientific Reports, (2020), 10, 1, (3542), 10.1038/s41598-020-60527-z)
Journal article

Ichikawa N. et al, (2020), Scientific Reports, 10

More publications