A brief update

I've been wracking my brain for a topic for this past week to settle on and use as a theme. But after the constant flow of adventures, it has been practically impossible to pick anything to focus on! Practically every evening last week I was in "the city" on some expedition or another. So much for me actually making money off the stipend they gave us. I suspect I'll be happy to just break even, but it's completely worth making the memories that will last me forever. So, instead of picking a nerdy neuroscience topic, I'm just going to add a bunch of pictures and tell a little about my life outside of academics.

This past friday, my entire program took a trip to the famous Bronx Zoo! After a morning presentation on the research done by the zoo's conservation department, we had free reign of the park. I tried my best to see every animal, but after 5 hours was still unsuccessful. 

One of the most impressive exhibits was the gorilla area. I've never seen so many of the large primates! Of course, I did my best to imitate the ape life....

Oh yeah, and then that same day a group of my friends and I went to see Swan Lake at the Metropolitan Opera House. So incredible! I went from spending all day in the sun, to getting dressed up for a classy night on the town.

Here are some of the lovely ladies who accompanied me to the ballet. We actually had more guys in our group than girls, but my camera wasn't used to take the big group shot. Still, I'd say it shows the kind of people who are a part of SURP in that even the guys are willing to spend Friday night at the ballet.

AND HAVE I MENTIONED THE FOOD?!?!?! Seriously though, I'm at risk to gain 50 lb. here! There's just so much new cuisine to try! The above picture is of udon from a very legitimate Japanese noodle shop. It was the perfect lunch before going to Central Park to see a free production of The Comedy of Errors. And yeah, and I spotted this guy:

BALTO!

Lastly, I spent Sunday chilling in a park before going to a Polish restaurant to celebrate my heritage and eat meat and potatoes till I was stuffed. As my last name indicates, I'm very Polish on my dad's side. But besides pierogis when I was little, I had never really been introduced to real Polish food. Luckily, I finally got that chance this weekend!

A sampler plate with pierogis, sausage, sauerkraut, and meat and barley
wrapped in cabbage. VERY Polish.

 

No meal would be complete without blood sausage. It
was salty, but otherwise not bad. Oh, and of course I
had a traditional Polish beer (or 2).

Auditory Stream Segregation

It's only been a week of research and adventure, but already I feel quite settled into my new home here at Albert Einstein College. And even better, I find I have already made progress on my work in the lab and feel that I am really learning a whole new skill set.

For example, how do you first distinguish
between sounds in a loud environment
like the NYC streets?

But I suppose I should start with the basics of what my lab is currently researching. As you may recall, I said in my last blog that Dr. Sussman is interested in auditory processing. But to be more specific than that, her lab is focused on unraveling the process called stream segregation. The simplest way to explain stream segregation is through example. Imagine yourself walking into a crowded area with people and noise all around. When you first enter, it all seems like one big cacophony but after some time, your brain distinguishes between sources and 'dials down' the ones that are deemed unimportant. Thus, in a crowded restaurant you can still focus on the conversation at hand and not be distracted by surrounding background noise.

With this general premise, the Sussman lab has run multiple experiments trying to tease apart how we recognize novel sounds and respond to them. Since most of these experiments have been completed, I have been focused on transforming this data into something easier to understand. AKA, I've been learning how to make pretty figures of ERPs and voltage maps. It sounds simple, but learning to use the software has been a fun challenge. And hopefully, some of my work will make it's way into a publication at the end of this all!

Here are some of the voltage maps I've made so far.

Oh, and yes, I've still been exploring NYC and all it has to offer (which is a lot!). So far this week, I haven't hardly been home before midnight because I've been off on some adventure. Whether that be a CollegeHumor live comedy show or a trip to the beach, it's been busy yet thrilling. I expect this next week will bring new challenges as well as explorations!

CollegeHumor live for $5- what a deal!

Beach adventure! What perfect weather!

First Bite of the Big Apple

As I said in my last post, I'm finally here in New York. I've never even been to the east coast before (besides a short weekend in Boston for Taekwondo), so it's been a completely new experience for me. And I'm not going to lie, my first day in 'the city' had me feeling gape-mouthed like a total tourist. Thank god I had my fellow SURP-ers to explore with this weekend and get a feel for the city.

We went into FAO Schwartz toy store- overwhelming! 

As soon as I saw the Rockefeller Plaza, the theme
song to 30 Rock popped into my head and
wouldn't leave! 

More Rockefeller..

This was at Times Square... I think. I was
engrossed in a conversation about research
at this point.

This was at Union Square and I don't know
what it is but I thought it looked cool.

I'm dying to try out the CitiBike project they
just started where you can rent a bike for a day!

This was taken from the High-line. It's
essentially an old train line that has been
converted into a garden walk that goes
over the city streets.

More High-line. It was so beautiful and
peaceful! I definitely plan to return!

Just to give you a taste, we walked from the lower part of Central Park to Union Square to the High-line and some beyond that. To tell the truth, I'm not exactly completely sure where-all we went. It was an over-whelming first day, followed by a second Sunday adventure across the Brooklyn Bridge. I haven't walked this much since back-packing when I was back in high school! I know I should have been expecting the city to be this huge, but it really hasn't hit me until finally walking the streets. I can't believe I get to spend the whole summer doing research and exploring Manhattan.

From the pier on Fulton Street.

Longhorn in Manhattan!

Freedom Tower near Ground Zero

The Brooklyn Bridge! 

I'm finally getting the hang of panoramic shots on my phone.

Oh yeah, research. That's the reason I'm here- right? Well, so far I haven't really gotten started with my actual research project. I've been assigned to Dr. Elyse Sussman's lab for the next eight weeks to continue my experience in EEG. In fact, it turned out to be the perfect match! I've spent the majority of the past year running participants on EEg, but now I get to try the other side of the coin and do actual data analyses. Based on the information I've been given so far, I will be processing an EEG data set and look for specific ERP components. It will be interesting to do work related to the auditory system instead of sleep (of which I am more familiar). But as things stand now, I've only been reading up on the subject and hope to start the real work this week!

Taken from Brooklyn.

Chronic sleep restriction affects behavioral and ERP correlates of psychomotor vigilance - AKA My First Poster

I suppose this entry is technically late. Tuesday represented my big debut into the fascinating world of sleep research with my first-ever poster session. Sure, I was able to assist in a presentation in January at an aging conference but this was the first work that I've ever presented solo. It was both terrifying and exhilarating. I probably spent the first 15 minutes alternating between terror that someone would ask a question and worry that no one would ask me about my research. But, unsurprisingly, the session went well with polite, friendly people asking a few questions and some even complementing me on my research. And now that I've run through my little spiel in an academic setting, I feel comfortable in sharing it here on the internet. Keep in mind, this isn't an exact replica of my academic-version of the presentation because I know how daunting such technical jargon can be.

The Constellation in Baltimore's Inner Harbpr

My lab was interested in how chronic sleep restriction (a lessening, but not total deprivation of sleep) affects sustained attention, both as a behavioral measure and through recordings of EEG*. Past research has shown that the PVT (psychomotor vigilance task) is an accurate measure of sustained attention. For an abbreviated, modified version of the task, click here. But essentially, participants were asked to watch the screen and hit the spacebar whenever they saw a stopwatch appear on the screen.

Our experimental design began with recruiting 24 undergraduate students with no neurological or psychological problems (including sleep disorders). We had them come into the lab where we recorded resting state EEG (which is sort of a baseline cortical activity) and recorded EEG while they performed the PVT. We then gave them actigraphs (wristwatches that record movement and thereby objective measures of sleep-wake cycles) and asked them to fill out a sleep log entry each day. There were approximately 6 weeks between each of the 3 EEG sessions so we got a span of the full semester.

Based on this data, we found that average daily sleep decreased between session 1 and sessions 2 & 3 (from around 7hrs to 6.5hrs) and this negatively predicted reaction times on the PVT. In other words, sleep went down and time it took to react went up.

My poster

On the EEG side, we found the amplitude of the P3 component significantly decreased from session 1 to sessions 2 & 3. P3 is a change in voltage which has been linked to decision-making in past research. We also found that alpha reactivity amplitude decreased between session 1 and sessions 2 & 3. This component is a little difficult to explain in layman's terms, but essentially a lowered amplitude in alpha reactivity has been linked to dementia, traumatic brain injury, and aging.

The changes in P3 amplitude and alpha reactivity each negatively predicted reaction times both across and within-subjects. What makes this incredible to me is that we saw such clear effects from only avery small change in average daily sleep. We plan to look from here at more specific measures of sleep such as circadian rhythms and sleep latency.

So, that's more or less what I got to present at the conference. It was pretty incredible to talk to so many experts in the field and I look forward to attending next year (hopefully!). For now, I've just settled into my room at Albert Einstein College of Medicine and have started to learn a little about what I'll be doing this summer. More to come on the New York experience next time!

*EEG or electroencephalography is a technique used to record electric potentials created by brain activity and recorded through the scalp. EEG is known for its high temporal (time-based) resolution, but low spatial (location-based) resolution. This makes it good for looking at timing in activation in the brain, but we cannot always locate the origin of the activation.

After a successful, if exhausting, first poster session.

Sleep Conference 2013- The Stuff of Dreams

I can't believe I'm here in Baltimore, MD at the annual Sleep Conference! This is my first real academic conference and already I'm exhausted and delighted. There are talks and posters over an entire spectrum of sleep-related fields (cognition, disease, metabolic rates, etc.)

While I've had a full day of presentations, I think my favorite topic of the day has been sleep, circadian rhythms, and metabolism. I suppose it could be because this is the issue most relevant to my current lifestyle. As an undergraduate student, twice a year the dreaded finals swing around and you find people living in the library and barely sleeping. These same students, afraid to waste precious procrastinating studying time, bring boxes of goldfish and coolers filled with red bull to sustain them. Personally, I try to avoid this behavior but I'm not always successful. And it's usually on nights when I'm scarfing down a whole box of cookies that I wonder, 'how the heck can I be so hungry when I've been sitting perfectly still for the last 8 hours?'

Well I'm not saying that the Sleep Conference is my personal answer to this question, but there has been quite a bit of recent research linking sleep deprivation with increased hunger, caloric consumption, and (in the end) weight gain. What I found most interesting was that one study (which I believe came out of this link) showed that sleep deprived participants did consume more calories, but statistically consumed less calories per waking hour than non-sleep restricted participants. This indicates to me that caloric intake isn't the whole story, and perhaps metabolic rates are shifted because of the lack of sleep so that the calories consumed are not efficiently put to use.

Mind you, this is just my take on a particular presentation and I suggest checking out original sources such as this to get the full story. Please feel free to chime in on the comments below as well!

To Infinity, and Beyond!

Ok, so I'm not really going as far as infinity, just New York. Still, that's a pretty big adventure for someone who went to college a scant 30 miles from home. I've never really lived in a big city and just moving to Austin was a drastic lifestyle change for me. But I'm so incredibly excited to have the chance to pursue my neuroscience research at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine in the Bronx.

That's right, this summer I finally nabbed a summer research position! Instead of spending my summer working at a cashier at a grocery store, I'll be out doing science! I really am beyond thrilled. In any case, I thought this research opportunity would be the perfect chance to return to my blogging. I went on an extended hiatus this year thanks to an over-loaded schedule (18 hours plus lab!) and a dearth of creativity. But now I'm back and pumped to share my exploits in the wonderful world of neuroscience.

Just so this entry isn't purely an update on my life, I do have something to share as well. It's a little program called the game of life. It was created by John Conway and relies on 4 simple rules.

1. Any live cell with fewer than two live neighbors dies, due to "loneliness."
2. Any live cell with two or three live neighbors lives onto the next generation.
3. Any live cell with exactly three live neighbors dies, due to "overcrowding."
4. Any dead cell with exactly three live neighbors becomes a live cell through "reproduction."

Although the rules seem incredibly simplistic, they create the building blocks to impressively complex systems. Here's a little taste:

Clearly, certain starting configurations give rise to highly complicated systems. I argue that this is similar to the direction we should be looking to in neural modeling. We know a single neuron receives input from its neighbors and depending on that input, sends a signal of its own. This is very much like the cells in the game of life which change or 'fire' depending on how their neighbors are acting.

While you can't draw an exact 1:1 correlation between the two systems, it still shares a property of emergence whereby cells flickering on and off create complex, interacting grids with an unique output. I don't know if anyone has pursued this kind of modeling in the years since the Game of Life was first developed, but I'd be curious to hear what my readers have to say about this.

And for those who can't get enough of the crazy constructs created in the Game of Life, for you:

All Science isn't Good Science

*Note: First of all, I want to apologize profusely for having been away so long for my blog.  I can tell you right now, it wasn't from sheer laziness as would be expected.  In fact my summer was spent working nearly every single day- including through the weekends.  I was hired on by my lab to continue assisting with the data analysis and on days I wasn't there, I worked in Central Market as a cashier.  But now the school year has begun and while I certainly have less free time, I will also have a lot more subject matter to write on.

Maybe this is merely my interpretation, but I believe the first two years of college for a science student are about teaching you "facts" while the second half is devoted to showing how we can get bad "facts" from a poorly designed study.  As a good scientist, one must always examine how the conclusion was reached and whether the experiment is actually sound.  I want to give 2 examples of studies which should not be used in modern science- one because the technology is far out-dated, and the other because of a poor subject selection and subsequent experimental design.

The Tilting Table
The first story I want to tell revolves around the famous psychologist- William James.  He has been quoted for his many insights into memory and cognition though very poetic language.  But did you know he also tried to create the first MRI in the 1890s?

Imagine a man lying on a perfectly flat table which has been balanced beneath him.  James then asked the man to think either about some emotional aspect, or to do a series of logical puzzles.  If this went on long enough, the table would tilt towards the head, as if it had become more heavy. This was the first attempt to understand blood flow as a mechanism for measuring what is being activated.

Keep in mind, this is beyond rudimentary.  It was an extremely clever idea at the time, but has since been outdated with PET scans and fMRIs.  The reason I include it under the heading "bad science" isn't because I'm not impressed with William James.  On the contrary, I find him a fascinating individual.  But I wanted to demonstrate that technology continually advances.  To use outdated technology in a modern experiment can alter the results in a way that is unknown to the experimenter.  The newest technology isn't always the best but we can't use outdated methods if we expect our work to be taken seriously.

The Talairach Brain
Within the past week, I have heard the Talairach brain mentioned at least 3 times and never with any reverence.  And when I learned more about it, I was astounded that anyone would keep it in use as an atlas for modern studies.  Here is, in my opinion, an example of science at its worst.

Talairach is the name of the researcher leading in the creation of this atlas.  An atlas, in neuroscience terms, is a model brain by which you can standardize the areas of activation found using fMRI studies.  It's a template that you lay your own images over to map where you say activation.

Here is an example of a structural scan using an MRI.  I
believe the Talairach model has been overlaid on the original.

But the Talairach model is a terrible choice.  Talairach used only one subject for his template whereas most modern research uses multiple brains which are averaged together to create a model more standard to the population.  The second problem with Talairach was that he used the brain of an alcoholic woman- which by no means has the same structure and function as a normal, healthy brain.  And as if that weren't bad enough, Talairach didn't even scan her entire brain.  He actually just scanned one hemisphere and then flipped it over to create a mirror image.  Normal brains have slightly different function and structure across the hemispheres.  This is a fact that Talairach completely disregarded in favor of ease.

The sad part is there are still some studies today which use the Talairach brain atlas.  Many other atlases have been created since then but the old design persists.  This is why it is important to understand what you are reading in scientific literature and be able to critically analyze it.  Not every published paper is without its faults.  This is an important lesson that I believe the lay public is not enough aware of.