This is a renewal application for a psychiatry/psychology functional neuroimaging research education program at Weill Medical College of Cornell University. The overall goal of this research education program is to develop and implement educational approaches that attract trainees from many academic backgrounds to, and that provide rigorous training in, the multidisciplinary field of functional neuroimaging research, particularly for the clinically relevant study of human neuropsychiatric disorders and neurocognitive development. The mechanisms to achieve this goal comprise a coordinated range of targeted initiatives, educational modules, mentored research experiences, and curricula, designed to accommodate different academic backgrounds and levels, and different, though complementary, areas of focus. For undergraduate and graduate or medical students pursuing relevant courses of study, lectures and course modules are used to expose them, and attract them, to this rapidly evolving field. For students spending a summer, an intensive curriculum and training experience is used to give them a theoretical and practical foundation regarding this research. For medical or graduate students and fellows pursuing more prolonged, advanced training, depth and breadth are achieved by combining an area of focus (studying a specific neuropsychological process, brain circuit or disorder with a particular method) with a core curriculum and set of experiences ensuring a comprehensive exposure to the main principles, findings and methods in basic behavioral neuroscience, cognitive neuroscience, imaging science, and neuropsychiatry. Instruction is also provided in the responsible conduct of research. The recruitment and retention of minority students remains an important goal and activity. This is a highly interdisciplinary training environment, with M.D.s and Ph.D.s working closely together to integrate medical, (neuro)biological and psychology/cognitive neuroscience perspectives; methods and applications; child, adult and geriatric neurobehavioral functions and pathology. The successful experience of the initial phase of this program is built upon by extending and deepening the educational initiatives and materials developed, and by adding new initiatives and materials. ? New themes will be added, including emphases on translational research, imaging genetics and multivariate image analysis, with a focus on fronto-limbic and fronto-striatal circuits of great relevance to neuropsychiatric and developmental disorders. Outreach and web-based educational activities will be expanded to expose even more prospective trainees to this field. ? ?
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