Registration is now open for the May William K. Warren, Jr. "Frontiers in Neuroscience" Conference.

Click here to download the full brochure.

Topic: Searching for Affective and Psychosis Genes Using Neurocognitive and Neuroimaging Endophenotypes
Presenter: Dr. David Glahn, Ph.D. Associate Professor at Yale University and Director of the Affective Disorders and Psychosis (ADAPTING) Laboratory at the Olin Neuropsychiatric Research Center
Where: Laureate Psychiatric Clinic and Hospital Conference Room
When: May 5, 2015 at 12 noon

To register, please call 918-494-6490 or email kecochran@saintfrancis.com.
The event is free and open to the public

All are encouraged to attend!

On Friday, May 8th at noon, Dr. Shunan Zhang will be presenting in Conference Room A on the LIBR Campus. Dr. Zhang is visiting from the University of California, San Diego in the Department of Cognitive Science.

Title: Human decision making and experimental design on bandit problems. 

On Monday, May 11th at noon, Dr. Michael Browning will present in Conference Room A on the LIBR campus.

Dr. Browning is an academic psychiatrist based at the University of Oxford in the UK. His research uses computational neuroscience to better understand the etiology of anxiety and depression. This knowledge is used to guide the development of novel treatments.

Title: Anxious individuals have difficulty learning the causal statistics of aversive environments

All are welcome to attend lectures at LIBR. Please RSVP to Meg Purdue at mperdue@laureateinstitute.org

On Wednesday, May 20th at 10am, Mahlega Hassanpour will present in Conference Room A on the LIBR campus.

Mahlega Samira Hassanpour is a PhD candidate in Biophysics at Washington University in St. Louis.

Title: "Developing Diffuse Optical Tomography (DOT) towards Neuroimaging of Speech Perception in People with Cochlear Implants"

Description:

Cochlear implantation has helped many people worldwide with severe to profound sensorineural hearing loss to restore hearing ability. However, speech perception outcomes vary widely across both adults and children recipients.  Previous findings suggest that the major source of variance in performance post-implantation lies in the differences in the neuronal and cognitive processes that brains of individuals apply to the signal that implanted device sends to their auditory system. While neuroimaging can potentially reveal these differences, current techniques are limited either due to safety concerns brought by the contraindication with metal implant (fMIR) or radiation dose limit (PET), or because of poor image quality (EEG/MEG, fNIRS). In our lab, we are developing a new neuroimaging modality known as high-density diffuse optical tomography (HD-DOT). HD-DOT provides noninvasive and metal-compatible imaging and has excellent temporal resolution (relative to the hemodynamic response) and proven to have fMRI comparable spatial resolution (at cortical level). Prior to utilize this technique for imaging speech perception in cochlear implanted patients, we needed to develop tools for analyzing complex brain signals recorded by HD-DOT and evaluate the performance of our system in imaging different levels of speech perception in normal hearing subjects. This talk will cover three main topics: (a) brief introduction to HD-DOT, (b) new methods developed for signal processing and (c) approaches to assess HD-DOT’s performance in mapping speech network.

Dr. Maurizio Bergamino and his co-authors have been named as the 2014 Galileo Galilei Award recipients from the European Journal of Medical Physics- Physica Medica (EJMP). His first-author paper "A review of technical aspects of T1-weighted dynamic contrast-enhanced magnetic resonance imaging (DCE-MRI) in human brain tumors" was selected as the best publication in EJMP in 2014. 

Full article reference: A review of technical aspects of T1‐weighted dynamic contrast‐enhanced magnetic resonance imaging (DCEMRI) in human brain tumors by M. Bergamino, L. Bonzano, F. Levrero, G. L. Mancardi, L. Roccatagliata, published in Physica Medica, Volume 30, Issue 6, September 2014, Pages 635‐643.

In his award letter, the Editor-in-Chief noted that "The Editorial team felt that this work gives a useful review of the technical issues involved in DCE‐MRI in the in vivo study of patients with brain tumors, with a focus of estimating the blood brain barrier permeability. Both theoretical models and experimental procedures are described; particularly useful is the description of data acquisition details, arterial input function assessment and methods for image analysis, so highlighting the role of the medical physicist in the assessment of this diagnostic imaging procedure".

Congratulations to Maurizio on this impressive achievement!

The Laureate Institute for Brain Research is pleased to announce Dr. Israel Liberzon, MD will be delivering a presentation on April 21, 2015 from noon to 1pm in the Laureate auditorium!

Dr. Liberzon, Professor of Psychiatry, Psychology and Neuroscience at the University of Michigan, will present “Novel Insights into PTSD: Genes, Neural Circuits and Sleep Physiology.”

We are honored to have the opportunity to present such a distinguished guest and researcher.

April 21, 2015
Lunch – 11:00 a.m. to 12 noon
Lecture – 12 noon to 1:00 p.m. (registration required)
Location – Laureate Main Auditorium/Conference Room

Please RSVP to:
Meg Perdue, Administrative Coordinator
Laureate Institute for Brain Research
mperdue@laureateinstitute.org or 918-502-5740