This award is funded under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (Public Law 111-5).
This award permits Dr. Brian Wandell and his collaborators at Stanford University to purchase a 3T functional magnetic resonance imaging scanner. The shared instrument will be the centerpiece of a new facility, The Center for Neurobiological Imaging, designed to advance scientific research and training on topics spanning human decision-making, cognition, perception, child development, education and emotion. The instrument will be used to support research that advances understanding of the human brain and also offer the opportunity to integrate teaching about brain functions and systems into the curricula of students in a variety of fields. The instrument will increase the efficiency and quality of a broad array of scientific research efforts that aim to understand human brain function, and ultimately apply this new knowledge to the development of effective social, economic, educational and legal systems. The research approach involves a partnership between basic scientists and engineers. The advances in imaging over the last fifteen years are still in an early phase and within the next ten years, scientists believe, it should be possible to measure the distributions of particular molecules within the brain, trace brain development in detail and measure properties of the neuroglia. The close proximity in the laboratory between magnetic resonance physicists, statisticians, psychologists and other social scientists will make it possible to explore collaboratively new imaging modalities and transform technical advances into scientific insights. The instrument and related software and analysis tools will also be used to train graduate students and post-doctoral fellows in advanced methods for understanding the human brain.
