Projects

Dates

Sunday, 1 July 2018 to Sunday, 30 June 2019

Funding source

NIH NIBIB (Subaward via Brown University)

The goal of Human Neocortical Neurosolver (HNN) project is to create a new software tool that gives researchers the ability to develop hypotheses on the location, time-course and circuit-level neural mechanisms underlying human Magneto/Electro-encephalography (MEG/EEG) and ECoG signals. The purpose of the subaward contract with SUNY Downstate is to make use of a unique neuronal network modeling language specification and programming interface (NetPyNE) to substantially increase the utility of the HNN software.

Dates

Tuesday, 28 February 2017 to Wednesday, 28 February 2018

Funding source

NYS DOH Spinal Cord Injury Research Board (SCIRB)

Introduction/Background: The function and organization of the brain primary motor cortex (M1) circuits -- crucial for motor control -- has not yet been resolved. Most brain-machine interfaces used by spinal cord injury patients decode their motor information from M1, predominantly from large layer 5 corticospinal cells. As part of our NIH-funded project we have developed the most realistic and detailed computational model of M1 circuits and corticospinal neurons up to date, based on novel data provided by experimentalist collaborators.

Dates

Wednesday, 31 August 2016 to Friday, 31 May 2019

Funding source

NIMH R01

We are developing a novel embedded-ensemble encoding (EEE) theory for mammalian neocortex to unify data from cell and network experiments, and to infer general principles of how information is processed in the brain. EEE theory is based on the observation that cortical pyramidal neurons produce synaptically-induced dendritic plateau potentials that place an individual neuron into an activated state. This brings that neuron near to threshold, and also reduces membrane time constant, so that the activated cell PNact can readily and rapidly follow synaptic inputs.

Dates

Tuesday, 31 December 1991 to Sunday, 31 December 2017

Funding source

NIH including NINDS, NIMH, NIA; Veteran's Administration.

We use multiscale modeling to look at brain diseases, treated by neurology, psychiatry, neurosurgery, physiatry (rehab) and other specialties.  Particular focuses have been on stroke, epilepsy and schizophrenia.  We have also modeled Alzheimer disease, Parkinson disease, dystonia and others.  As one example, our recent studies of schizophrenia have emphasized the need for multiple scale analysis for evaluating the connections between molecular and synaptic alterations at the lower scales with the transmission of information leading to disruptions of thought at the higher scales.

Dates

Sunday, 28 February 2010 to Saturday, 30 May 2015

Funding source

DOD DARPA

The purpose of this effort is to fuse computational and biological principles to develop realistic computational models of the sensorimotor system, which can be used in a silico/biological coadaptive symbiotic system of rehabilitation. This effort shall focus on the creation of new technologies for use in neuroprosthetic rehabilitative solutions and the development of a test bed which that can be used to further expand integrative medical devices for repair and enhancement of biological systems.

Dates

Tuesday, 31 May 2016 to Sunday, 31 January 2021

Funding source

NIMH R01

Multiscale modeling using computer simulation is increasingly recognized as a major method, along with data-mining, for assimilating the vast and ever-growing knowledge base in systems biology. This will improve understanding of the links between molecules and disease manifestation for translational research to the clinic. The bridging of chemophysiology (chemical signaling in neurons and astrocytes) with electrophysiology provides a fundamental connection that will necessarily underpin higher organizational scales.

Dates

Sunday, 14 September 2014 to Wednesday, 30 May 2018

Funding source

NIH NIBIB (U01 award)

We will develop a multi-scale model of primary motor cortex (area M1) based on a rich experimental dataset obtained in ongoing studies. The model will range from the level of ion channels in dendrites, up to the level of the inputs from and outputs to other areas of cortex, a range of microns to centimeters, with a temporal range of milliseconds to 10 sec. We will evaluate dynamical interactions across scale, made more complicated by a structure that features long apical dendrites of Layer 5 pyramidal cells that reach across layers of cortex and thereby across scales.