Britta Westner
@brittawestner.bsky.social
240 followers 330 following 19 posts
Assistant Professor in Neuroscience at the Donders Institute & Radboudumc. Oscillations, language, the visual system, source reconstruction methods, and decoding. Open source enthusiast. https://britta-wstnr.github.io
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Reposted by Britta Westner
igor-dgps.bsky.social
🔍 Have we solved the replication crisis?

Join us for an IGOR panel discussion on the state of Open Science in biological psychology more than a decade after the crisis first hit.

📅 Friday, 10 Oct | 10:00–11:00 CET
💻 Online (contact us for the link)

#OpenScience #neuroskyence #academicsky

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Reposted by Britta Westner
eringrant.me
Our #CCN2025 GAC debate w/ @gretatuckute.bsky.social, Gemma Roig (www.cvai.cs.uni-frankfurt.de), Jacqueline Gottlieb (gottlieblab.com), Klaus Oberauer, @mschrimpf.bsky.social &‬ @brittawestner.bsky.social asks:

📊 What benchmarks are useful for cognitive science? 💭
2025.ccneuro.org/gac
Speakers and organizers of the GAC debate. Time and location of the GAC debate: 5 PM in Room C1.03.
Reposted by Britta Westner
lspitzer.bsky.social
@brittawestner.bsky.social is talking about #OpenSource software in academia. There's not enough room for people focusing on this, which is a problem for the development of new software, but also their maintaining (which is especially problematic when others build on your software...)! #OpenScience
Reposted by Britta Westner
irisvanrooij.bsky.social
This workshop is FREE btw
irisvanrooij.bsky.social
✨We are organising (again) an online workshop on Theoretical Modeling for PhD candidates and Master students in cognitive science and psychology. Check out the website and the schedule: Registration is open! (closes July 1, spaces are limited) 🧵1/n computationalcognitivescience.github.io/workshop/
Cover of the textbook used in the workshop
Reposted by Britta Westner
irisvanrooij.bsky.social
✨We are organising (again) an online workshop on Theoretical Modeling for PhD candidates and Master students in cognitive science and psychology. Check out the website and the schedule: Registration is open! (closes July 1, spaces are limited) 🧵1/n computationalcognitivescience.github.io/workshop/
Cover of the textbook used in the workshop
Reposted by Britta Westner
omersharon.bsky.social
Important message.
TLDR; cite the software not the paper.
brittawestner.bsky.social
Ever used open-source (neuroscience MEG/EEG) software? Please take a moment to check out this report from within.

This paper is very close to my heart, because we are moving towards a crisis … 🧵

bsky.app/profile/imag...
imagingneurosci.bsky.social
New paper in Imaging Neuroscience by Britta U. Westner, Tim M. Tierney, et al:

Cycling on the Freeway: The perilous state of open-source neuroscience software

doi.org/10.1162/imag...
Reposted by Britta Westner
goneill.bsky.social
An important commentary on the state of M/EEG software and the perverse fact we all rely on something which there is little reward in writing and maintaining.

This needs to change.

That, or we never allow these authors to ever get on a plane together.
brittawestner.bsky.social
Ever used open-source (neuroscience MEG/EEG) software? Please take a moment to check out this report from within.

This paper is very close to my heart, because we are moving towards a crisis … 🧵

bsky.app/profile/imag...
imagingneurosci.bsky.social
New paper in Imaging Neuroscience by Britta U. Westner, Tim M. Tierney, et al:

Cycling on the Freeway: The perilous state of open-source neuroscience software

doi.org/10.1162/imag...
Reposted by Britta Westner
johnashburner.bsky.social
While maintenance is a big part of the software life-cycle, user support can be just as time consuming - if not more so. Support needs can be reduced by providing (and maintaining) decent documentation, but this is also not something that funders seems to consider important.
brittawestner.bsky.social
Indeed, very good point!
Reposted by Britta Westner
gutlin.bsky.social
An important call from a lot of people I worked together with on MNE Python.

If you use free open source software for your research, please read this.

It's a lot of work building the tools that we as scientists use. In turn, we can help them by e.g. citing them correctly.
imagingneurosci.bsky.social
New paper in Imaging Neuroscience by Britta U. Westner, Tim M. Tierney, et al:

Cycling on the Freeway: The perilous state of open-source neuroscience software

doi.org/10.1162/imag...
brittawestner.bsky.social
Thanks to all co-authors on this work,
especially Dan McCloy and Eric Larson as my co-lead-authors,
and Alex Gramfort, @danielskatz.org, @arfon.bsky.social, Arnaud Delorme, @vlitvak.bsky.social, Scott Makeig, @robertoostenveld.bsky.social, Jan-Matthijs Schoffelen, Tim Tierney
brittawestner.bsky.social
We also believe that this is necessary to not only keep open source software packages around, but also to make them more inclusive.
If open source is seen as an important contribution to science, this will facilitate the participation of currently underrepresented groups.
brittawestner.bsky.social
We call for urgent change before it’s too late and software packages many of us rely on go unmaintained.
We need better valuation of open source work in academia and better funding mechanisms. Citing the software and not the paper can further help with giving credit to open source contributors.
brittawestner.bsky.social
And did you know that the academic incentive and funding systems are not supporting open source software well enough - especially not the work of maintaining already existing software to keep it usable?
brittawestner.bsky.social
Did you know that many of our software packages are relying on only 1-3 people who have sufficient oversight of the software to keep it going?
(Check the paper for our analysis!)
brittawestner.bsky.social
Ever used open-source (neuroscience MEG/EEG) software? Please take a moment to check out this report from within.

This paper is very close to my heart, because we are moving towards a crisis … 🧵

bsky.app/profile/imag...
imagingneurosci.bsky.social
New paper in Imaging Neuroscience by Britta U. Westner, Tim M. Tierney, et al:

Cycling on the Freeway: The perilous state of open-source neuroscience software

doi.org/10.1162/imag...
Reposted by Britta Westner
benediktehinger.bsky.social
🧵 1/5 Excited to share our latest @joss-openjournals.bsky.social 🧪 #paper:

UnfoldSim.jl

New @julialang.org package to simulate continuous event-based time series for #EEG & beyond!

📜 doi.org/10.21105/jos...
🛠 github.com/unfoldtoolbo...

With @judithschepers.bsky.social, Luis Lips & Maanik Marathe
Reposted by Britta Westner
sarangnemo.bsky.social
Congrats to @brittawestner.bsky.social (NEMOlab alumna 😊), Floris @predictivebrain.bsky.social, and team! Did you win more cake? 🧁🍰🧁🍰😜
fmrib-steve.bsky.social
Excited to announce the 500th paper published by Imaging Neuroscience ! @imagingneurosci.bsky.social @mitpress.bsky.social

We've come a long way in a short time and are hugely grateful to the neuroimaging community for your support.

Hope to see lots of you at OHBM @ohbmofficial.bsky.social
imagingneurosci.bsky.social
New paper in Imaging Neuroscience by Britta U. Westner, Floris P. de Lange, et al:

Typical neural adaptation for familiar images in autistic adolescents

doi.org/10.1162/imag...
brittawestner.bsky.social
Honoured to be paper number 500, together with my co-authors @predictivebrain.bsky.social et al! 🎉 Congratulations, @imagingneurosci.bsky.social and thanks to the Editors for making the famous move to start from scratch 💙
fmrib-steve.bsky.social
Excited to announce the 500th paper published by Imaging Neuroscience ! @imagingneurosci.bsky.social @mitpress.bsky.social

We've come a long way in a short time and are hugely grateful to the neuroimaging community for your support.

Hope to see lots of you at OHBM @ohbmofficial.bsky.social
imagingneurosci.bsky.social
New paper in Imaging Neuroscience by Britta U. Westner, Floris P. de Lange, et al:

Typical neural adaptation for familiar images in autistic adolescents

doi.org/10.1162/imag...
brittawestner.bsky.social
New paper published with co-first-author Ella Bosch, and Christian Utzerath, Jan Buitelaar, and @predictivebrain.bsky.social ! We find that neural adaptation to familiar images is not different between autistic and non-autistic peers. #MEG #neuroscience
imagingneurosci.bsky.social
New paper in Imaging Neuroscience by Britta U. Westner, Floris P. de Lange, et al:

Typical neural adaptation for familiar images in autistic adolescents

doi.org/10.1162/imag...
Reposted by Britta Westner
wzuidema.bsky.social
Encouraging to see 5000+ protesters at our local Amsterdam protests against the budget cuts in higher education in the NL! In this time of geopolitical tensions, changing climate, democratic backsliding, & tech revolutions, governments should *invest* in knowledge & the future of the next generation