The mission of the Design and Analysis Core (DAC) is to provide faculty-level support for neuroscience research in principled study design, statistical modeling, inference, machine learning and high performance computation. The DAC is complementary to but distinct from the Behavior and Neuroimaging Core (BNC), with the BNC providing practical, implementation services. The DAC has the following Specific Aims in the Phase II: (1) Provide project-specific, faculty-level collaboration to COBRE Project Leaders (PLs) on design and analysis; (2) Develop novel statistical methodology and computing toolboxes for study design and comprehensive analysis of neuroimaging and behavioral data; (3) Coordinate and facilitate access to the Brown University central computing and information infrastructure and provide complementary support on data management; (4) Serve as a locus for training and exchange of ideas on computational neuroscience and extend the statistical and computational support to the growing community of neuroscience researchers in Rhode Island. The DAC consists of four faculty members from the Departments of Biostatistics and Computer Science, and two staff scientists, one shared with the BNC. The DAC will support the COBRE Projects by matching faculty expertise to specific scientific goals, by guiding experimental design, identifying adequate statistical and computational approaches and performing data analysis. Since the innovative research proposed in the COBRE projects will yield complex data that may require new statistical methods, the DAC will also develop novel statistical methodology for the design and analysis of neuroimaging and behavioral data. Once an analysis approach is developed, the DAC aims to enable the COBRE PLs to obtain the workflow, so that they could reapply the tools to the same type of experiments. The DAC and the BNC work together to coordinate with the Center for Statistical Sciences, the Data Sciences Initiative, and Center for Computation and Visualization at Brown University, to help the PLs achieve the most efficient, reliable, and reproducible analysis of their research data, and to maintain analysis process in a system that ensures continuity of research within the project and lowers the boundary for cross-project transferring, as well as dissemination to the external scientific community. The DAC will extend its support to the large community at Brown University and its affiliated hospitals, by providing training opportunities together with other entities that also promote interdisciplinary research, including the Data Science Initiative, the Advance Clinical and Translational Research and other COBRE centers in Rhode Island.
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