OHBM Neurosalience

This week, Peter talks to Dr. Melanie Boly, a neurologist and neuroscientist who has worked for more than fifteen years in the field of altered states of consciousness such as vegetative state, sleep and anesthesia. In this wide ranging discussion, Peter and Melanie address everything related to her work on consciousness.  They start with some of her early work on resting state as a modulator for detecting subtle stimuli and then get into a discussion on a working definition of consciousness and her work on understanding the neural correlates of consciousness. Melanie is a proponent of the idea that many, if not all, of the fundamental physical correlates of consciousness reside in the posterior part of the brain. Peter and Melanie also discuss Integrated Information Theory (IIT): how it helps us begin to understand consciousness. Last they consider her studies of sleep and how dreaming is not limited to REM sleep.  This interesting discussion straddles theoretical work and practical clinical applications of brain imaging. For more info on the Neurosalience podcast and the guests, visit: https://www.ohbmbrainmappingblog.com/

Welcome back to Neurosalience! In this episode Peter Bandettini talks to production lead, Dr Rachael Stickland. They discuss the best bits and themes from season 1 and what to expect from season 2. 

This episode focuses on layer activity fMRI, an important and rapidly emerging area of neuroimaging research. Layer fMRI opens up the possibility of mapping directional communication channels between active brain regions. Peter discusses the challenges, limits and opportunities of ultra-high resolution fMRI with four leaders in this research field - Rainer Goebel, David Feinberg, Jon Polimeni & Renzo Huber.

In this podcast, Peter talks to Dr. David Poeppel, a Professor of Psychology and Neural Science at New York University (NYU). Peter and David discuss how MRI and other imaging modalities may play a part in truly understanding the brain as well as what it even means to understand the brain. They discuss David’s past work with Greg Hickok on language pathways, and his work in the auditory cortex. Another topic discussed is the potential impact of David’s work clinically as well as the need to start with, and progressively add to, models of the brain.

Michael Breakspear, Ph.D. is a physicist and psychiatrist and the leader of the Systems Neuroscience and Translational Neuroimaging Group at the Hunter Medical Research Institute at the University of Newcastle in Australia. In this wide ranging discussion, Peter talks to Michael about his motivations for dynamic modeling of the brain and how his research may pay off in the long run towards clinical applications. Michael is also the Editor in Chief of the journal NeuroImage; there is discussion of some of the changes that have occurred, such as new types of papers, new policies on data sharing, and of course the transition to open access. Michael mentions a new offshoot of NeuroImage called NeuroImage reports, which welcome re-analysis of previous results. Lastly, recent news of the Australian National University shutting down its Neuroscience program because of budget problems is discussed.

Dr. Ahmad Hariri is Professor of Psychology & Neuroscience at Duke University, where he is also the Director of the Laboratory of NeuroGenetics. Dr. Hariri recently published an important paper on the test-retest reliability of common task-fMRI measures. This received attention in the field and from the popular media and generated useful discussions. In this podcast Peter and Ahmad discuss the implications of this paper and how to address the challenges it presents and continue to move the field forward. This is an informative and positive discussion about how to collectively address these issues as a field.

This podcast idea was precipitated by Dimitri Kullman’s 2020 editorial in Brain, causing a stir in the community. It levelled criticism about the clinical validity of fMRI. Some of it was outdated but some was indeed on point.  In this podcast we had a great discussion on all things fMRI -  what it can and cannot measure, and how it can continue to proceed. We also discuss some of the scientific culture surrounding fMRI. Overall, the discussion was useful in bringing some of the flaws as well as some of the outstanding innovations to light. We ended up agreeing that fMRI is in fact, an extremely useful tool that allows penetrating insight into the brain at a specific temporal and spatial scale. We feel that there is still considerable hope yet also considerable challenge in increasing its clinical relevance. Guests:  Dr. Dimitri Kullmann is a professor of Neurology at UCL Queen Square Institute of Neurology. Dr. Vince Calhoun is the director, since 2019, of Translational Research in Neuroimaging and Data Science (TReNDS), which includes three universities: Georgia State, Georgia Tech, and Emory.

Here Peter Bandettini has a wide  ranging discussion with the 2021 Early Career Investigator Awardee, Chao-Gan Yan. They talk a bit about his career path, the highly impactful work he has been doing, as well as some of the most challenging issues in fMRI: dealing with motion, variability, finding biomarkers, and designing just the right packages that help the beginner and  expert alike. Chao-Gan gives some great advice to new investigators regarding what was important to him to get him where he is today.

In this week's episode, Peter discusses the history of the Open Science Special Interest Group and the unique and important role this group plays in OHBM, alongside Janine Bijsterbosh, Johanna Bayer, Katie Bottenhorn, Melvin Selim Atay and Aki Nikolaidis. The OHBM Open Science Special Interest Group fosters open science not only by encouraging best practices and sharing data and code, but by encouraging inclusivity in science and open ended discussion in a supportive environment.

Join host Peter Bandettini as he talks with Dr. Nikolaus Weiskopf, Director of the Department of Neurophysics at the Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences.