Université de Montréal

Over the course of more than 135 years, the Université de Montréal (UdeM) has become one of the world’s leading research universities. Its outstanding teaching, rigorous research, and talented students keep UdeM in the ranks of top universities year after year.

The Université de Montréal innovates through the work conducted at its Centre interdisciplinaire de recherche sur le cerveau et l'apprentissage (Center for Interdisciplinary Research on Brain and Learning, or CIRCA). This Center on brain and learning aims to accelerate interdisciplinary research and its applications through two-way reinforcement between the brain sciences and disciplines that operate in practice settings. CIRCA's research work is approached in an interdisciplinary manner by more than 60 researchers from 17 units and 7 faculties working on campus. Through its programming and its four thematic research axes, CIRCA acts as a catalyst for multidisciplinary research in learning, an area with a great potential to impact the community. CIRCA helps change mentalities and ways of doing things by providing an environment and mechanisms that enable those working in these research sectors to transcend boundaries.

The Work at CIRCA

CIRCA members study the neural basis of neuroplasticity and learning processes and the factors that disrupt and promote learning at different ages. CIRCA also creates two-way links between brain science and data science to develop innovative intervention approaches to improve learning. The Center focuses its activities on themes for which this multidisciplinary approach has yet to be explored by other research centers in Quebec through four major interrelated axes: normal mechanisms of learning, perception, and behavior; learning, perception, and behavior disorders; intervention, diagnostic, and therapeutic tools; and computational neurosciences and neuroinformatics (transversal axis).

CIRCA Researchers

CIRCA is composed of 64 researchers, including the director, Dr. Christian Casanova, and the four axis managers, Dr. Isabelle Archambault, Dr. Arlette Kolta, Dr. Karim Jerbi, and Dr. Richard Robitaille. For a complete list of member researchers as well as their profiles and fields of expertise, please visit the website: https://www.circa.umontreal.ca/membres/ (in French only)