  In recent years, Artificial Intelligence (AI) shows a spectacular ability of
insertion inside a variety of disciplines which use it for scientific
advancements and which sometimes improve it for their conceptual and
methodological needs. According to the transverse science framework originally
conceived by Shinn and Joerges, AI can be seen as an instrument which is
progressively acquiring a universal character through its diffusion across
science. In this paper we address empirically one aspect of this diffusion,
namely the penetration of AI into a specific field of research. Taking
neuroscience as a case study, we conduct a scientometric analysis of the
development of AI in this field. We especially study the temporal egocentric
citation network around the articles included in this literature, their
represented journals and their authors linked together by a temporal
collaboration network. We find that AI is driving the constitution of a
particular disciplinary ecosystem in neuroscience which is distinct from other
subfields, and which is gathering atypical scientific profiles who are coming
from neuroscience or outside it. Moreover we observe that this AI community in
neuroscience is socially confined in a specific subspace of the neuroscience
collaboration network, which also publishes in a small set of dedicated
journals that are mostly active in AI research. According to these results, the
diffusion of AI in a discipline such as neuroscience didn't really challenge
its disciplinary orientations but rather induced the constitution of a
dedicated socio-cognitive environment inside this field.
