Developing Novel Statistical Methods in NeuroImaging

University Of California-Irvine, Irvine CA

Investigators

Abstract

The proposed project is a workshop on "Developing Novel Statistical Methods in NeuroImaging". The plan is to hold the workshop on July 24-26, 2012 at the University of California at San Diego which will immediately precede the Joint Statistical Meeting (JSM 2012) in San Diego, California. The primary goal of the workshop is to identify open problems in statistical research that emerge from current challenges in neuroimaging. The analysis of brain data presents statistical challenges because of its massiveness, high dimensionality and complex spatio-temporal dependence structure. It is anticipated that open lines of statistical research will be identified -- especially in the areas of time series, spatial analysis, dimension reduction, statistical learning, functional data analysis, statistical computation and foundations of statistical inference. To achieve the stated workshop goal, the first step is to equip quantitative scientists (statisticians and mathematicians) with the necessary theoretical background in neuroscience, thereby familiarizing them with the data. Several lectures will be delivered by leading neuroscientists. The second step is to cover the state-of-the-art statistical methods for the analysis of brain imaging data and to identify the limitations of the current approaches. Scientists from diverse research areas and career stages will meet in order to identify and discuss key emerging areas of interdisciplinary neuroimaging research where mathematical sciences promise to play an important role in the coming years. The plan is to utilize funds from the NSF to provide partial support to young researchers (including recent PhD grads, PhD and post-doctoral students). Junior statisticians who belong to under-represented groups (e.g., women and minorities) are encouraged to apply. Details on the workshop are available online: http://www.ics.uci.edu/~hombao/neurostatsw2012.html.