Student Investigator Travel Awards for OHBM 2015

University Of Southern California, Los Angeles CA

Investigators

Abstract

? DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): This is an NIH R13 application to fund travel awards for deserving students and trainees to attend the 2015 annual meeting of the Organization for Human Brain Mapping (OHBM; www.humanbrainmapping.org), to be held in Honolulu, Hawaii. The OHBM is the primary international organization dedicated to non-invasive neuroimaging research and the functional organization of the human brain, and its Annual Meeting is regarded as a premier venue for the integration of innovative brain imaging methods and cognitive neuroscience. It is first and foremost an educational forum for the exchange of up-to-the-moment and groundbreaking research in the area of human brain mapping. The meeting is expected to gather 3000 or more scientists whose work depends upon various brain imaging modalities. Student attendees include medical students, graduate students, residents in clinical neuroscience (neurology, psychiatry, and neurosurgery) and post-doctoral fellows in fields related to human brain mapping. Student attendees are a regular and effective feature of this meeting and, in past years, have typically given more than 1/3 of all oral presentations at the annual meeting. Recent past meetings of OHBM were held in: Melbourne Australia 2007; Chicago, Ill 2008; San Francisco CA 2009, Barcelona Spain 2010, Quebec City, Canada 2011; Beijing China, 2012; Seattle, WA 2013; and Hamburg, Germany 2014. Under this proposal, we will support travel awards for selected US-based students and trainees who are first authors on the most highly ranked submitted conference abstracts. We will also provide support for a small number of students working in developing nations, who might not otherwise be able to cover the costs for attending the meeting. Supporting travel awards for this meeting has relevance for the NIH research and educational mission in the following ways: a) virtually every presentation relates to the function and structure of the human brain, in both health and disease; b) improved understanding of the organization of the human brain is directly relevant to treating neurological disease; and c) the use of non-invasive imaging methods is increasingly important to translational investigation and training in clinical neuroscience. The OHBM conference program will highlight emerging structural and functional MRI imaging approaches to tracking brain systems organization, connectivity and plasticity, and imaging genetics. By providing relief from travel costs, student and trainee scientists interested in basic systems neuroscience, non-invasive imaging technology, and neurologic medicine will be better able to take part in the OHBM's premier international event for outstanding interdisciplinary scientific and educational experience on the mapping of the human brain.