Ayaka Kato on Strikingly

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Hi, I'm Ayaka Kato (加藤郁佳), a research associate at RIKEN Center for Brain Science and a Ph.D. student at the University of Tokyo in Japan.
I have been studying the neural mechanism of motivation and addiction.

KEYWORDS: Neuroscience, Dopamine, Reinforcement learning, Digital therapeutics, Addiction, Computational Psychiatry, Open Science
CV
latest update 2022.04.15
Link for CV
Publication
Google Scholar https://scholar.google.co.jp/citations?user=27OzVqAAAAAJ&hl=ja

(updated 22.04.15)

Morita, K., & Kato, A. (2022). Dopamine ramps for accurate value learning under uncertainty. Trends in Neurosciences.

Shimomura, K., Kato, A., & Morita, K. (2021). Rigid reduced successor representation as a potential mechanism for addiction. The European Journal of Neuroscience, 53(11), 3768.

Kario, K., Nomura, A., Kato, A., Harada, N., Tanigawa, T., So, R., ... & Satake, K. (2021). Digital therapeutics for essential hypertension using a smartphone application: A randomized, open‐label, multicenter pilot study. The Journal of Clinical Hypertension, 23(5), 923-934.

Kato, A., Kunisato, Y., Katahira, K., Okimura, T., & Yamashita, Y. (2020). Computational Psychiatry Research Map (CPSYMAP): a new database for visualizing research papers. Frontiers in Psychiatry, 11, 1360.

Kato, A., & Morita, K. (2020). Dynamical Systems Approach: An Elementary Introduction and Application to Research on Dopamine and Reinforcement Learning. Brain and Nerve= Shinkei Kenkyu no Shinpo, 72(11), 1275-1282.

Kato A, Tanigawa T, Satake K, Nomura A (2020) Efficacy of the Ascure Smoking Cessation Program: Retrospective Study JMIR Mhealth Uhealth 2020;8(5):e17270

Morita K & Kato A (2018) A Neural Circuit Mechanism for the Involvements of Dopamine in Effort-Related Choices: Decay of Learned Values, Secondary Effects of Depletion, and Calculation of Temporal Difference Error. eNeuro, ENEURO-0021.

Kato A & Morita K (2016) Forgetting in Reinforcement Learning Links Sustained Dopamine Signals to Motivation. PLoS Comput Biol 12(10): e1005145. doi:10.1371/journal.pcbi.1005145
Code: https://senselab.med.yale.edu/ModelDB/ShowModel.cshtml?model=195890#tabs-1
Morita K and Kato A (2014) Striatal dopamine ramping may indicate flexible reinforcement learning with forgetting in the cortico-basal ganglia circuits. Front. Neural Circuits 8:36. doi: 10.3389/fncir.2014.0003

Click the figures to access the papers

Rigid reduced successor representation as a potential mechanism for addiction
Computational Psychiatry Research Map (CPSYMAP): A New Database for Visualizing Research Papers
Efficacy of the Ascure Smoking Cessation Program: Retrospective Study
A Neural Circuit Mechanism for the Involvements of Dopamine in Effort-Related Choices
Forgetting in Reinforcement Learning Links Sustained Dopamine Signals to Motivation.
Striatal dopamine ramping may indicate flexible reinforcement learning with forgetting in the cortico-basal ganglia circuits.
Education
2017.4 - current
Ph.D. student, Department of Life Sciences, Graduate School of Arts and Sciences,
The University of Tokyo
Laboratory for Circuit Mechanisms of Sensory Perception @ RIKEN CBS
Supervised by Dr. Hokto Kazama / Skills: Ca2+ imaging
2017.9 - 2018.9
MSc in Neuroscience, Graduate Programme in Neuroscience,
University of Oxford
1st dissertation: Human TMS & MEG project - advisor: Dr. Matthew Rushworth
2nd dissertation: Rodent dopamine juxtacellular recording project-advisor: Dr. Peter Magill
2015.4 - 2017.3
MSc, Department of Biological Sciences, Graduate School of Science,
The University of Tokyo advisor: Dr. Yasuo Ihara / Skills: MATLAB Programing, Multi-agent simulation, Genetic Algorism
2011.4 - 2015.3
BSc, Department of Biological Sciences, School of Science,
The University of Tokyo advisor: Dr. Takeo Kubo and Dr. Hideaki Takeuchi / Skills: Wavelet analysis, CRISPR-Cas9
Awards and Grants
Frist prize in the first whole brain architecture Hackathon in Tokyo (2015) “Curiosity based exploration using place cell”
Scholarship from Son-Masayoshi Foundation (2017-2021)
JSPS research fellow (DC2 2019.4-2021.3)
Director Poster Award, Gold prize, at the RIKEN CBS Retreat
Presentations and invited talks
Kato A & Kazama H Encoding of innate values of odors by dopaminergic neurons. The 43rd Annual Meeting of the Japan Neuroscience Society 07/2020

Ayaka Kato, Tomoyuki Tanigawa, Kohta Satake, Akihiro Nomura EFFICACY OF THE NOVEL DIGITAL ASCURE SMOKING CESSATION PROGRAM COMBINING SMARTPHONE APP AND WEB BASED MENTORING Poster-> https://cureapp.institute/resource/img/pdf/SNRT_abstract.pdf
Society for Research on Nicotine & Tobacco (SRNT) 25th Annual Meeting San Francisco, California USA, February 2019

Kato A & Morita K Forgetting in reinforcement learning reconciles the two roles of dopamine: reward prediction error and motivational drive (633.06.)
Society for neuroscience San Diego USA 11/2016

Itoh T*, Ukita J*, Kato A* *Equal contribution Modeling the development of place cells in hippocampus.
Annual International Conference on Biologically Inspired Cognitive Architectures Lyon France 11/2015

Kato A & Morita K Potential mechanistic account for the suggested relationship between the ramping dopamine signal and sustained motivational drive: a study of reinforcement learning model.
doi: 10.12751/nncn.bc2015.0095 Bernstein Conference Heidelberg Germany 09/2015

Kato A & Morita K
Exploring models of reinforcement learning to explain the ramping DA signal in the striatum.
The 37th Annual Meeting of the Japan Neuroscience Society, Yokohama Japan 09/2014
Experiences
2018.10 - 2021.3
Researcher -- CureApp Inc
Project: Evaluating the efficacy of the Ascure Smoking Cessation Program
Skills: R, Logistic regression, Academic writing

2018.12 - 2019.3
Research assistant - UTEC (Venture Capital)

2018.2 - 2018.6
Internship in R&D  sector -- Araya (Japanese startup) 
Project: Exploratory research on how to utilize Phi-tool box https://figshare.com/articles/phi_toolbox_zip/3203326
Skills: MATLAB, Analyzing Network

2015.11  – 2016.3
Internship in R&D  sector -- Colorful Board (Japanese startup) 
Project: Visualizing user’s fashion preference for personalized recommendation system
Skills: Python, Natural language processing (Word2Vec)

2015.8 – 2016.2
Hackathon winner -- Whole Brain Architecture Hackathon in Tokyo
Project: Developing an agent exploring novel virtual space by self-localization and mapping
Skills: Python, recurrent neural network (LSTM)

2013.8  –  2018.2 
Research Assistant -- University of Tokyo  (Supervisor: Dr. Kenji Morita)
Project: Computational modeling of motivation as reinforcement learning with forgetting
Skills: MATLAB Programing, Reinforcement learning, Nonlinear dynamics
Projects
Click the icons to see the link related to the current projects I'm working on!

PhD project in experimental neuroscience
Research in digital therapeutics
System design of the new database
Contact

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Profile

CV

latest update 2022.04.15

Publication

Rigid reduced successor representation as a potential mechanism for addiction

Computational Psychiatry Research Map (CPSYMAP): A New Database for Visualizing Research Papers

Efficacy of the Ascure Smoking Cessation Program: Retrospective Study

A Neural Circuit Mechanism for the Involvements of Dopamine in Effort-Related Choices

Forgetting in Reinforcement Learning Links Sustained Dopamine Signals to Motivation.

Striatal dopamine ramping may indicate flexible reinforcement learning with forgetting in the cortico-basal ganglia circuits.

Education

Awards and Grants

Frist prize in the first whole brain architecture Hackathon in Tokyo (2015) “Curiosity based exploration using place cell”Scholarship from Son-Masayoshi Foundation (2017-2021)JSPS research fellow (DC2 2019.4-2021.3)Director Poster Award, Gold prize, at the RIKEN CBS Retreat

Presentations and invited talks

Experiences

Projects

Click the icons to see the link related to the current projects I'm working on!

PhD project in experimental neuroscience

Research in digital therapeutics

System design of the new database

Contact

Frist prize in the first whole brain architecture Hackathon in Tokyo (2015) “Curiosity based exploration using place cell”
Scholarship from Son-Masayoshi Foundation (2017-2021)
JSPS research fellow (DC2 2019.4-2021.3)
Director Poster Award, Gold prize, at the RIKEN CBS Retreat