{"658033":{"#nid":"658033","#data":{"type":"news","title":"Thackery Brown Probes the \u2018Black Box Problems\u2019 in Cognitive Neuroscience ","body":[{"value":"\u003Cp\u003E\u003Ca href=\u0022https:\/\/psychology.gatech.edu\/thackery-i-brown\u0022\u003EThackery Brown\u003C\/a\u003E has always viewed the mysteries of the human mind as \u0026ldquo;black box problems.\u0026rdquo; The assistant professor in the \u003Ca href=\u0022https:\/\/psychology.gatech.edu\/\u0022\u003ESchool of Psychology\u003C\/a\u003E specializes in cognitive neuroscience because it enables him \u0026ldquo;to get behind the curtain and understand why cognition succeeds and fails, and potentially study ways of improving it.\u0026rdquo;\u003C\/p\u003E\r\n\r\n\u003Cp\u003ECognition, the mental process of acquiring, using, and storing knowledge, will continue to dominate Brown\u0026rsquo;s research, thanks to a two-year funding grant from the \u003Ca href=\u0022https:\/\/curcifoundation.org\/\u0022\u003EShurl and Kay Curci Foundation\u003C\/a\u003E, which has awarded $20 million since its founding in 2006 to research projects that \u0026ldquo;will lead to significant advances in medicine or scientific knowledge.\u0026rdquo;\u003C\/p\u003E\r\n\r\n\u003Cp\u003EIt\u0026#39;s part of a busy season for Brown. In addition to the Curci funding, he\u0026#39;s just received a\u0026nbsp;research grant\u0026nbsp;from the \u003Ca href=\u0022https:\/\/www.nia.nih.gov\u0022\u003ENational Institute on Aging\u003C\/a\u003E, and he and members of his lab\u0026nbsp;just published a new study on memory recall and spatial navigation.\u0026nbsp;\u003C\/p\u003E\r\n\r\n\u003Cp\u003EThe Curci grant \u0026ldquo;is a great honor,\u0026rdquo; Brown says.\u0026nbsp;\u0026ldquo;One of the challenges, especially among young scientists, is having opportunities to do research that\u0026rsquo;s really on the cutting edge of our field. That\u0026rsquo;s where it\u0026rsquo;s more high-risk, high-reward. It\u0026rsquo;s harder to support big ideas, especially when you\u0026rsquo;re junior faculty, so this is a great opportunity to get at the forefront of the field\u0026rsquo;s biggest questions.\u0026rdquo;\u003C\/p\u003E\r\n\r\n\u003Cp\u003EA priority for the Curci Foundation is research dealing with neuroscience and brain science, which lends to the title for Brown\u0026rsquo;s Curci research project:\u0026nbsp;\u0026quot;Establishing the neural mechanisms behind our cognitive maps through development of a virtual reality and closed-loop neurofeedback platform.\u0026rdquo;\u003C\/p\u003E\r\n\r\n\u003Cp\u003ECognitive maps are how we view the layout of our physical environment in our minds, and learning more about how we construct them and encode the information in them into memory is key to treating Alzheimer\u0026rsquo;s and other memory-related disorders, as well as the normal aging process.\u003C\/p\u003E\r\n\r\n\u003Cp\u003EWhat Brown has proposed \u0026ldquo;could potentially change the way we approach memory research,\u0026rdquo; he says. Brown wants to combine traditional brain imaging tools like magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) and electroencephalography\u0026nbsp;(EEG) with machine learning in a unique way.\u0026nbsp;\u003C\/p\u003E\r\n\r\n\u003Cp\u003E\u0026ldquo;The idea here would be to develop a neurofeedback system, where essentially if we can read out signatures that the brain is attempting to create, we can feed-back stimuli to the brain that can enhance or strengthen those neural signatures.\u0026rdquo;\u003C\/p\u003E\r\n\r\n\u003Cp\u003EMachine learning would allow this to happen in real time. \u0026ldquo;It could start to interpret neural signals as they\u0026rsquo;re coming out of the recording device, rather than the researcher needing to go offline and crunch numbers, which is worthless if you\u0026rsquo;re trying to change someone\u0026rsquo;s neural function \u003Cem\u003Ein situ\u003C\/em\u003E, or as they\u0026rsquo;re engaged in it.\u0026rdquo;\u003C\/p\u003E\r\n\r\n\u003Cp\u003E\u003Cstrong\u003EMind-mapping our environments\u0026nbsp;\u003C\/strong\u003E\u003C\/p\u003E\r\n\r\n\u003Cp\u003EIn addition to the Curci funding, Brown is also part of a research team whose study, \u003Ca href=\u0022https:\/\/pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov\/35389701\/\u0022\u003E\u0026ldquo;Episodic memory integration shapes value-based decision-making in spatial navigation\u0026rdquo;\u003C\/a\u003E, will soon be published in the \u003Cem\u003EJournal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition\u003C\/em\u003E. The team is made up of Georgia Tech School of Psychology and \u003Ca href=\u0022https:\/\/econ.gatech.edu\/\u0022\u003ESchool of Economics\u003C\/a\u003E researchers, and the accepted manuscript version of the study was published \u003Ca href=\u0022https:\/\/pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov\/35389701\/\u0022\u003Eonline\u003C\/a\u003E April 7.\u0026nbsp;\u003C\/p\u003E\r\n\r\n\u003Cp\u003EThe team includes postdoctoral fellow \u003Ca href=\u0022https:\/\/scholar.google.com\/citations?user=Fnub5csAAAAJ\u0026amp;hl=en\u0022\u003EQiliang He\u003C\/a\u003E, research assistants \u003Ca href=\u0022https:\/\/www.linkedin.com\/in\/elizabeth-beveridge\u0022\u003EElizabeth Beveridge\u003C\/a\u003E, \u003Ca href=\u0022https:\/\/www.linkedin.com\/in\/lou-eschapasse-bb60721a9\u0022\u003ELou Eschapasse\u003C\/a\u003E, and \u003Ca href=\u0022https:\/\/www.linkedin.com\/in\/vanesa-vargas-650223176\u0022\u003EVanessa Vargas\u003C\/a\u003E, all from the School of Psychology; and doctoral candidate \u003Ca href=\u0022https:\/\/econ.gatech.edu\/people\/person\/09952c77-116f-5f42-94a1-0a42d9b70a32\u0022\u003EJancy Liu\u003C\/a\u003E from the School of Economics. All are members of Brown\u0026rsquo;s \u003Ca href=\u0022https:\/\/maplab.gatech.edu\/people\/\u0022\u003EMemory Affect Planning (MAP) Lab\u003C\/a\u003E.\u003C\/p\u003E\r\n\r\n\u003Cp\u003ESpatial navigation \u0026mdash; knowing where you are, how you got there, and how to get to another destination \u0026mdash; is a key cognitive ability. Brown\u0026rsquo;s research team wanted to know what factors go into the choices humans make when navigating based on memories. Participants learned where various objects were in a virtual environment, and then decided whether to reach those goals from familiar starting locations or unpredictable ones,\u003C\/p\u003E\r\n\r\n\u003Cp\u003E\u0026ldquo;We created a (computational) model of just how much people were integrating prior experiences into their current choices,\u0026rdquo; Brown says. \u0026ldquo;We\u0026rsquo;re hopeful this is a new tool for the field. It may be used for other types of tasks like interpreting neuroimaging data, for example \u0026mdash; how much of this behavior or brain activity is being influenced by prior experiences?\u0026rdquo;\u003C\/p\u003E\r\n\r\n\u003Cp\u003EBrown says the recent study is similar to the kind of research he\u0026rsquo;ll work on with the Curci funding. \u0026ldquo;What we want to do in the Curci award is try to strengthen people\u0026rsquo;s mental maps of their environments. The current theory that people broadly hold is that our cognitive maps of environments really come about by integrating different (memory) episodes. When you have two navigational experiences and they cross paths, you stick them together and you start to build a little map.\u0026rdquo;\u003C\/p\u003E\r\n\r\n\u003Cp\u003EThe published study tries to determine how good people are in integrating all their different experiences into their cognitive maps, and the decisions that are then made based on that information. \u0026ldquo;In the Curci award, we want to try to zoom in on the neural signature of the maps themselves, and try to strengthen them to lead to better performance.\u0026rdquo;\u003C\/p\u003E\r\n\r\n\u003Cp\u003E\u003Cstrong\u003ENIH National Institute on Aging grant\u003C\/strong\u003E\u003C\/p\u003E\r\n\r\n\u003Cp\u003EBrown was notified in early May that he had won another cognitive neuroscience-related grant, this one a five-year award\u0026nbsp;from the \u003Ca href=\u0022https:\/\/www.nia.nih.gov\/\u0022\u003ENational Institute on Aging (NIA)\u003C\/a\u003E, one of the 27 institutes and research centers that make up the \u003Ca href=\u0022https:\/\/www.nih.gov\/\u0022\u003ENational Institutes of Health\u003C\/a\u003E.\u003C\/p\u003E\r\n\r\n\u003Cp\u003EBrown says the NIA research mission is related to the Curci award. While that grant is more concerned with state-of-the-art method development and understanding cognitive map neural signals by manipulating them, the NIA grant focuses on how the structure of our environment, like the layouts of buildings and roads, is stored by the brain.\u003C\/p\u003E\r\n\r\n\u003Cp\u003E\u0026ldquo;The grant also asks two questions,\u0026rdquo; Brown adds. \u0026ldquo;Can we understand individual differences in navigation ability by studying the way our brain stores this structure information? And can differences in how people\u0026#39;s spatial memory declines with age be understood in part by how fragmented their neural maps of their environment are?\u003C\/p\u003E\r\n\r\n\u003Cp\u003E\u0026ldquo;This is another huge honor for me. It will support my lab and research program for five years, and combined with the Curci this support touches on many of the big questions about how humans are able to plan and navigate their lives.\u0026rdquo;\u003C\/p\u003E\r\n\r\n\u003Cp\u003EDOI: \u003Ca href=\u0022https:\/\/doi.apa.org\/doiLanding?doi=10.1037%2Fxlm0001133\u0022\u003Ehttps:\/\/doi.apa.org\/doiLanding?doi=10.1037%2Fxlm0001133\u003C\/a\u003E\u003C\/p\u003E\r\n\r\n\u003Cp\u003E\u003Ca href=\u0022https:\/\/pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov\/35389701\/\u0022\u003Ehttps:\/\/pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov\/35389701\/\u003C\/a\u003E\u003C\/p\u003E\r\n\r\n\u003Cp\u003E\u003Cem\u003EFunding for the Journal of Experimental Psychology study was provided by the \u003Ca href=\u0022https:\/\/www.nih.gov\/\u0022\u003ENational Institutes of Health\u003C\/a\u003E and their \u003Ca href=\u0022https:\/\/www.nia.nih.gov\/\u0022\u003ENational Institute on Aging\u003C\/a\u003E, and the \u003Ca href=\u0022https:\/\/www.warrenalpertfoundation.org\/\u0022\u003EWarren Alpert Foundation\u003C\/a\u003E.\u003C\/em\u003E\u003C\/p\u003E\r\n","summary":null,"format":"limited_html"}],"field_subtitle":"","field_summary":[{"value":"\u003Cp\u003EThackery Brown, assistant professor in the School of Psychology, has won a pair of prestigious research grants from the Curci Foundation and National Institute on Aging \u0026mdash; and his lab has new research findings on memory, spatial navigation, and decision-making.\u003C\/p\u003E\r\n\r\n\u003Cp\u003E\u0026nbsp;\u003C\/p\u003E\r\n","format":"limited_html"}],"field_summary_sentence":[{"value":"Brown has won a pair of prestigious research grants from the Curci Foundation and National Institute on Aging \u2014 and his lab has new research findings on memory, spatial navigation, and decision-making."}],"uid":"34434","created_gmt":"2022-05-09 14:18:51","changed_gmt":"2022-05-09 19:49:08","author":"Renay San Miguel","boilerplate_text":"","field_publication":"","field_article_url":"","dateline":{"date":"2022-05-09T00:00:00-04:00","iso_date":"2022-05-09T00:00:00-04:00","tz":"America\/New_York"},"extras":[],"hg_media":{"658016":{"id":"658016","type":"image","title":"Thackery Brown at Georgia Tech\u0027s Center for Advanced Brain Imaging. (Photo Thackery Brown)","body":null,"created":"1651861953","gmt_created":"2022-05-06 18:32:33","changed":"1651861953","gmt_changed":"2022-05-06 18:32:33","alt":"","file":{"fid":"249429","name":"thackery brown at CABI.jpeg","image_path":"\/sites\/default\/files\/images\/thackery%20brown%20at%20CABI.jpeg","image_full_path":"http:\/\/hg.gatech.edu\/\/sites\/default\/files\/images\/thackery%20brown%20at%20CABI.jpeg","mime":"image\/jpeg","size":103142,"path_740":"http:\/\/hg.gatech.edu\/sites\/default\/files\/styles\/740xx_scale\/public\/images\/thackery%20brown%20at%20CABI.jpeg?itok=1-532HDe"}}},"media_ids":["658016"],"related_links":[{"url":"https:\/\/cos.gatech.edu\/news\/virtual-reality-helps-reveal-honeycomb-grids-human-brain-navigation","title":"Virtual Reality Helps Reveal Honeycomb Grids in Human Brain for Navigation"},{"url":"https:\/\/cos.gatech.edu\/news\/remembering-ourselves","title":"Remembering Ourselves"},{"url":"https:\/\/cos.gatech.edu\/news\/summer-bounty","title":"A Summer Bounty"},{"url":"https:\/\/cos.gatech.edu\/news\/mice-and-megahertz-qiliang-he-wins-fellowship-study-gamma-wave-stimulation-reversing-age","title":"Of Mice and Megahertz: Qiliang He Wins Fellowship to Study Gamma Wave Stimulation for Reversing Age-Related Memory Damage"}],"groups":[{"id":"1278","name":"College of Sciences"},{"id":"443951","name":"School of Psychology"},{"id":"1188","name":"Research Horizons"},{"id":"66220","name":"Neuro"}],"categories":[{"id":"134","name":"Student and Faculty"},{"id":"135","name":"Research"},{"id":"138","name":"Biotechnology, Health, Bioengineering, Genetics"}],"keywords":[{"id":"4896","name":"College of Sciences"},{"id":"167710","name":"School of Psychology"},{"id":"175547","name":"Thackery Brown"},{"id":"190555","name":"Shurl and Kay Curci Foundation"},{"id":"187499","name":"National Institute on Aging"},{"id":"2270","name":"National Institutes of Health"},{"id":"1228","name":"memory"},{"id":"175448","name":"cognitive neuroscience"},{"id":"3034","name":"decision-making"},{"id":"365","name":"Research"},{"id":"172970","name":"go-neuro"},{"id":"187915","name":"go-researchnews"}],"core_research_areas":[{"id":"39441","name":"Bioengineering and Bioscience"},{"id":"39501","name":"People and Technology"}],"news_room_topics":[],"event_categories":[],"invited_audience":[],"affiliations":[],"classification":[],"areas_of_expertise":[],"news_and_recent_appearances":[],"phone":[],"contact":[{"value":"\u003Cp\u003ERenay San Miguel\u003Cbr \/\u003E\r\nCommunications Officer II\/Science Writer\u003Cbr \/\u003E\r\nCollege of Sciences\u003Cbr \/\u003E\r\n404-894-5209\u003C\/p\u003E\r\n","format":"limited_html"}],"email":["renay.san@cos.gatech.edu"],"slides":[],"orientation":[],"userdata":""}}}