Currently Hiring Postdoctoral Fellow @ Harvard/MIT AA Martinos Center for Biomedical Imaging in Boston MA.

We are currently hiring multiple postdoctoral fellows for the project described below. This job posting is for an individual with significant expertise in both the acquisition and analysis of fMRI data. Our hire will lead 7T fMRI and MRS data collection at the Harvard/MIT A.A. Martinos Center for Biomedical Imaging in Boston MA, with opportunities to work on developing and implementing novel analytic techniques in neuroimaging.

For an example of previous work on this project, please see: Mujica-Parodi LR, et al. Diet modulates brain network stability, a biomarker for brain aging, in young adults. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 2020 Mar 3. pii: 201913042. doi: 10.1073/pnas.1913042117. PMID: 32127481

Protecting the Aging Brain: Self-Organizing Networks and Multi-Scale Dynamics Under Energy Constraints. The project views the aging brain from the perspective of optimization under constraint, using methods from statistical physics. We aim to identify the "rules" that govern synaptic self-organization, involving trade-offs between cooperative function and finite resources, specifically metabolism. Multi-scale modeling, incorporating data from neurons (firing-dynamics measured with patch-clamp) to neuron clusters (calcium imaging of excitatory and inhibitory connections), all the way to whole-brain, inter-region, dynamics in humans (measured with ultra-high-field 7T fMRI), are being used to predict how small changes in initial conditions (e.g., neuron insulin resistance), and/or small perturbation in the form of pharmacological intervention, yield nontrivial emergent effects at the macro scale.

Positions are for 3 years; salary competitive and commensurate with experience. Although this is a multi-site study, the physical work location for this position will be Boston, MA. Please send cover letter and cv (including contact information for three references) to:

Dr. Lilianne R. Mujica-Parodi and Dr. Eva-Maria Ratai: lstrey@mgh.harvard.edu and ERATAI@mgh.harvard.edu

This hire is through the Laboratory for Computational Neurodiagnostics, jointly located in NY (at the Stony Brook University Department of Biomedical Engineering and Laufer Center for Physical and Quantitative Biology) and Boston (at the Harvard/MIT A.A. Martinos Center for Biomedical Imaging)

Funding: W.M.Keck Foundation, NSF BRAIN Initiative