2009


3T installation

  • 10 November. Our new 3T MRI system has arrived on campus!


























Julia moves on to greener pastures

  • 1 November. After completing her postdoc with the lab, Julia has moved to the Centre for Clinical Research to commence her new position in epilepsy research. We wish her the best of luck in her new career.


More Grant Success!

  • 29 October. Greig has been awarded an NHMRC Career Development Award.More information on the Research Funding page.


Grant success!

  • 26 October. David Copland and Katie McMahon were successful with their ARC Discovery Project application this round, as was Greig who was also awarded a QEII Fellowship. More information on the Research Funding page.


Workshop on Statistical Parametric Mapping for Functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging

  • 30 September. The ARC Network in Human Communication Science (HCSNET) will be hosting a workshop on SPM for fMRI on campus, November 18-20, with an emphasis on imaging in language research. Deadline for expressions of interest: 28 October. For more information, see the HCSNET workshop page.



Postdoctoral Research Fellowships in Aphasia Rehabilitation

  • 22 September. The Centre for Clinical Research Excellence (CCRE) in Aphasia Rehabilitation has several postdoctoral research fellowships available, including one in Brisbane. Applications close 30/09.



Greig the Future Fellow

  • 10 September. Greig has been awarded an ARC Future Fellowship to pursue research on the cognitive neuroscience of language.



Research Assistant position

  • 9 September. We have a joint RA position available with QIMR to assist with the twin imaging project data analyses. Applications close 25/9. Details may be found here.



Farewell to Chloe

  • 14 August. Chloe has completed her project and returned to PHELMA.



Talking Brains

  • 17 June. Greg Hickok's and David Poeppel's excellent Talking Brains blog has broadened our discussion of semantic somatotopy below, with some interesting responses from Friedemann Pulvermüller and David Kemmerer. Thanks to Greg and David for hosting this discussion.



Somatotopic organisation of action word meanings - Again!

  • 26 June. We're very interested in claims of a so-called "semantic somatotopy" in primary and premotor cortex (i.e., overlapping activity for executing/observing actions performed with a specific effector and retrieving word meanings related to that effector). See Tash Postle's paper in NeuroImage last year in which the peak maxima from neuroimaging studies cited as evidence for this claim were plotted against cytoarchitectonic maps of BA4 and BA6 in the language dominant left hemisphere. Friedemann Pulvermüller and colleagues have a new fMRI paper using cluster analysis in press in Human Brain Mapping in which they conclude that "The motor-premotor region was dominated by semantic somatotopy... with face, arm, and leg word activation foci at inferior lateral (-49/11/16), dorsolateral (-32/-5/52), and dorsal sites (-19/-21/61)." So, here are 10 mm spheres centred on those peak maxima plotted in relation to the cytoarchitectonic maps of BA4 (red) and BA6 (blue) from Eickhoff et al. (2006). Again, not much congruency with respect to the actual cortical motor areas, and as motor execution and/or observation conditions weren't included in the study, we have no evidence that these clusters are representative of the actual neuronal ensembles used by the participants to perform effector movements. Interestingly, though, the leg peak is in BA6 this time.













References:

Pulvermüller, F., Kherif, F., Hauk, O., Mohr, B., & Nimmo-Smith, I. (in press). Distributed cell assemblies for general lexical and category-specific semantic processing as revealed by fMRI cluster analysis, Human Brain Mapping.

Eickhoff, S.B., Heim, S., Zilles, K., & Amunts, K., (2006). Testing anatomically specified hypotheses in functional imaging using cytoarchitectonic maps. NeuroImage, 32, 570–582.


Chloe and Sarah have arrived


Congratulations, Dr Sveller

  • 25 June. Congratulations to Christina Sveller who has been awarded her doctorate!


HBM2009 posters

  • 17 June. Gabriella's and Julia's posters for HBM2009 now available on the Conference Abstracts page.


Congratulations, Dr Strudwick

  • 7 May. Congratulations to Mark Strudwick who has been awarded his PhD!


New Horizons

  • 28 April. Greig making a point or grasping for a peanut at the New Horizons meeting in Hawaii earlier this month.

































New paper in press

  • 3 April. We have a new paper in press reporting the effects of ldopa on striatal resting state connectivity in the Journal of Neuroscience. See Publications page.


CNS Meeting

  • 30 March. Greig back from the Cognitive Neuroscience Society meeting where he had the chance to catch up with colleagues including Greg Hickok and David Poeppel of Talking Brains fame.


New paper on naming processes in press

  • 18 March. We have a new paper reporting auditory context effects in picture naming in press in Cognitive, Affective, & Behavioral Neuroscience. See Publications page.


OHBM 2009 Abstracts

  • 5 March. We have a host of abstracts accepted for the Human Brain Mapping meeting! See Abstract page.


Greig speaking at MACCS


New paper on semantic priming and dopamine in press

  • 30 January. Dave Copland's paper on the effects of levodopa on semantic priming is in press in Cerebral Cortex. See Publications page.


Australian Neuroscience Society meeting

  • 29 January. Greig speaking at the Australian Neuroscience Society meeting in Canberra. See Abstracts page.


New paper on genetics and DTI in press

  • 16 January. New paper in press in Journal of Neuroscience on the genetics of white matter measured with DTI. See Publications page.


2008

Happy Holidays

  • 19 December. A happy holiday season to everyone who helped make the fMRI lab successful this year, with best wishes for the new year. See you in 2009.


CNS 2009 abstracts

  • 18 December. Our two abstracts accepted for the Cognitive Neuroscience Society Meeting 2009! See Abstract page.


New Horizons in Human Brain Imaging meeting

  • 5 December. Greig has been invited to speak at the New Horizons in Human Brain Imaging: A Focus on the Pacific Rim meeting, immediately prior to the International Society for Magnetic Resonance in Medicine (ISMRM) meeting in Hawaii next year. See Abstract page.


Australian Neuroscience Society meeting

  • 5 December. Greig has been invited to speak at the Australian Neuroscience Society meeting in Canberra next year in a symposium on Bridging the gap: Human neuroimaging as the interface between brain and cognition. See Abstract page.


Katie promoted

  • 13 November. Katie has been promoted to Senior Research Fellow, effective January 2009. Congratulations, Katie!


Sad news

  • 20 October. We received the sad news that our colleague and friend, Jonathan Chalk, passed away this morning after a long battle with cancer. As a neurologist, Jon made significant contributions to neuroimaging research into Alzheimer's disease and stroke. He will be missed.


HCSNet Workshop


Gabriella at SPR meeting


ANAT3022 lectures

  • 7 October. Greig will be lecturing in ANAT3022 for the next 3 weeks.


Another paper on mirror neurons and language in press

  • 29 September. We've another fMRI paper in press on the putative links between mirror neurons and language. This one's for a special issue of the journal Brain & Language. See the Publications page.


Marjorie Villien homeward bound

  • 15 August. Marjorie is returning to MINATEC.


Another paper in press for Julia

  • 12 August. Julia's paper from her PhD on the influence of colour and sound on neuronal activation during visual object naming has been accepted for publication in Brain Research. See the Publications page.


Natasha's PhD paper in press

  • 7 August. Tash's fMRI paper from her PhD project on the putative somatotopic organisation of action word meanings has been accepted for publication in NeuroImage. This is the full paper describing the study in the SFN poster mentioned below. See the Publications page.


Julia's first postdoc paper in press

  • 29 July. Julia's paper on the semantic blocking effect in speech production has been accepted for publication in the Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience. See the Publications page.


Another genetics paper in press

  • 17 July. Paper in press in a Special Issue of Brain Imaging and Behavior. See the Publications page.


Marjorie Villien visiting

  • 11 June. Marjorie is visiting from MINATEC for 3 months while she completes a phMRI project.


Posters for HBM 2008 meeting

  • 10 June. Julia's and Mark's posters for next week's Organisation of Human Brain Mapping Meeting in Melbourne are now available for viewing! See the Conference Abstract page.


More doubts about a somatotopic organisation of action word meanings

  • 28 May. Some of our recent work has addressed claims of a so-called "semantic somatotopy" in primary and premotor cortex (i.e., overlapping activity for executing/observing actions performed with a specific effector and retrieving word meanings related to that effector). See Tash Postle's poster presented at SFN last year on the Conference Abstracts page in which the peak maxima from neuroimaging studies are plotted against cytoarchitectonic maps of BA4 and BA6 in the language dominant left hemisphere. Folks have noted that some studies have reported peaks in the right hemisphere too. So, here are the peak maxima in the right hemisphere for the two studies that reported overlapping activation for arm movements and arm related words, plotted in relation to the cytoarchitectonic maps of BA4 (red) and BA6 (blue). Again, not much congruency, either with respect to actual motor cortical areas or across studies.














References:

Esopenko, C., Borowsky, R., Cummine, J., & Sarty, G. (in press). Mapping the semantic homunculus: A functional and behavioural analysis of overt semantic generation. Brain Topography.

Hauk, O., Johnsrude, I., Pulvermüller, F. (2004). Somatotopic representation of action words in human motor and premotor cortex. Neuron 41, 301-307.

Another grant

  • 22 April. Helen Chenery's ARC Linkage Infrastructure Equipment and Facilities (LIEF) application has been funded after some time on the wait list! Details on the Research Funding page.


First genetics paper in press

  • 8 April. Gabriella's first fMRI study of twins is now in press in a special issue of Biological Psychology. See the Publications page.


Greig at CNS 2008 meeting

  • 7 April. Greig will be attending the Cognitive Neuroscience Society meeting in San Francisco next week. Visit him at his poster. He'll also be receiving a Top Reviewer award from Elsevier/Neuropsychologia.


Abstracts for HBM 2008 meeting

  • 3 March. Abstracts accepted for the Organisation of Human Brain Mapping Meeting 2008! See Abstract page.


Julia's first PhD paper in press

  • 15 February. The first paper from Julia's PhD is in press in Cerebral Cortex. See the Publications page for more information.


Back on deck

  • 7 January. We're all back on deck after the holidays. Luckily, Australia Day is only 3 weeks away...


2007

Grant Success!

  • 18 December. Dave Copland's grant application for a 128 channel geodesics EEG system was a success. Congratulations Dave! See the Research Funding page for more information.


Julia's viva

  • 14 December. Julia has been awarded her PhD. Well done!
  • 9 December. Julia Hocking is flying back to UCL to complete her viva and be awarded her PhD.


Abstract for CNS 2008 meeting

  • 5 December. Abstract accepted for Cognitive Neuroscience Society Meeting 2008! See Abstract page.


HBM2008 Symposium

  • 30 November. Our symposium submission for the Human Brain Mapping 2008 conference was accepted, one of only three to be scheduled! It's entitled On the Relevance of Functional Neuroimaging to Psychology and features Rik Henson, Max Coltheart, Russ Poldrack and Greig as speakers.


Acupuncture papers

  • November. Mark Strudwick has had his first papers accepted from his PhD project describing a new point injection method for fMRI. Congratulations, Mark!


Strudwick MW, Wilson SJ. Automated Syringe Driver for Acupoint Injection in fMRI Studies: a case for quantified point injection in neuroimaging studies of acupuncture. Expert Rev Med Devices.
Strudwick MW, Hinks RC, Choy STB. Point injection as an alternative acupuncture technique: an exploratory study of patient responses. Acupuncture in Medicine.


Grant success!


  • September 25-26. We've had terrific luck this grant round with the NHMRC and ARC, having 3 project and 1 infrastructure grants funded. See the Research Funding page for more information!


Sad news

  • September. We received the sad news that our friend and colleague Ginny Ng from the IOP in London passed away earlier this month after a fight with cancer. Ginny's professional and personal touch will be sorely missed.


CMR Review Recommendations

  • August 22. The review of the Centre for Magnetic Resonance has been completed. Draft recommendations by the expert panel have included permitting the centre to enrol PhD students and joint appointments with schools, departments and institutes for research staff. These recommendations are welcomed by the lab members. If you are interested in commencing a PhD in cognitive neuroscience next year, or having us lecture in your subjects/courses, do let us know!


Jan Hoffmann visiting

  • August. Jan is visiting from the Hochschule für Angewandte Wissenschaften, Hamburg until December. He will be working on the twins imaging project.


NHMRC Grant Review Panel

  • August 6-10. Greig is in Melbourne for the NHMRC Neurology and Brain Imaging Grant Review Panel.


Abstract for SFN 2007 meeting

  • 3 July. Natasha's abstract accepted for Society for Neuroscience Meeting 2007! See Abstract page.


Travel award

  • Julia Hocking has been awarded an OHBM travel award for the June 2007 meeting in Chicago to present her abstract entitled Cross-modal object processing in three different anterior temporal regions. Congratulations, Julia!


NIH Award Letter

  • 24 May. We received our award letter from the NIH for our grant "Genetic influences on the brain: A twin imaging study".


Gabriella Blokland visiting

  • 28 March. Gabriella is visiting from the Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam until October. She will be working on the twins imaging project.


Abstracts for CNS and OHBM 2007 meetings

  • Abstracts accepted for CNS and OHBM 2007! See Abstracts page.


Greig is back

  • Greig is back at work as of February after taking a combination of paternity, recreation and long service leave.


2006


Andrew Hockey graduates

  • Andrew Hockey graduated in December with his Masters of Philosophy. His thesis was Computational modelling of the laguage production system: Semantic memory, conflict monitoring and cognitive control processes. Congratulations, Andrew!


Julia is here

  • Julia Hocking arrived 30 October, and is now working in the lab!


APS Award!



2005


We're on the cover of the March 2005 issue of Cognitive Brain Research!


Issue Cover!




de Zubicaray, McMahon, Eastburn, Finnigan and Humphreys (2005). fMRI evidence of word frequency and strength effects during episodic memory encoding.






For better or worse, the press has also occasionally taken an interest in some of our work...

  • Melbourne Age, January 7, 2006, All the rage – the prognosis for 2006
  • Australasian Science, June 2002, 23(5), 36-37. Testing the ghost with the machine
  • Sydney Morning Herald, October 2001, Talk about a dream gene
  • Melbourne Age, October 2001, Science seeks gift of the gab
  • ABC Radio National, June 2001, Brain Map
  • The Sci Files (CSIRO National Science Radio interview), July 2001, Mapping what the brain is up to

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