Building Better Brains
Full video and powerpoint presentation; "Building Better Brains"; March 10, 2017.
Full video and powerpoint presentation; "Building Better Brains"; March 10, 2017.
Stacy Drury is a clinician scientist focused on the life-long effects of early child adversity, including child maltreatment. She co-directs the Stress Environment Research Collaborative in Health Disparities (SERCH) at Tulane University and serves as the Associate Director of the Tulane Brain Institute. She is also the Vice Chair of Research in the Department of Pediatrics and holds the Remigio Gonzalez, M.D. endowed professor of Child Psychiatry. She also directs the genetic and epigenetic studies of the on-going Bucharest Early Intervention Project.
Drury explores how the interaction of genetic and epigenetic factors with early experience shapes neurodevelopment and long term health outcomes in children. Her clinical practice and translational research focuses on improving long-term outcomes in at-risk children and infants through an enhanced understanding of the interaction between early life experiences, the stress response systems, child health and neurodevelopment. She is the director of the Behavioral and Neurodevelopmental Genetics Laboratory (BANGL), which includes both a molecular genetics basic science “wet” laboratory and a translational research program.
She holds a B.A. in Religious Studies & Biology from the University of Virginia, an M.S. in Human Genetics from the University of Michigan, a Ph.D. in Genetics and Biometry from Louisiana State University Health Center and an M.D. from the same institution.
David Van Essen received his undergraduate degree from the California Institute of Technology and his doctorate from Harvard University. He was a postdoctoral fellow in Boston, Norway and England before joining the Caltech faculty in 1976. In 1992 he moved to Washington University in St. Louis and chaired the Department of Anatomy and Neurobiology for two decades.
Van Essen is internationally known for his research on the structure, function, connectivity, evolution, and development of cerebral cortex in humans and nonhuman primates. His tension-based theory of morphogenesis accounts for how and why the cortex gets its folds. His laboratory has developed powerful methods of computerized brain mapping, with a particular emphasis on surface-based visualization and analysis of cerebral cortex. He has been a pioneer in neuroinformatics and data sharing efforts for nearly two decades. He has written more than 200 peer-reviewed articles and invited publications.
Van Essen was a Principal Investigator of the Human Connectome Project (HCP), a highly successful endeavor to map brain function and connectivity in healthy young adults. He is currently a PI on two Lifespan HCP consortium projects. He has been a leader in two major professional societies, serves on several advisory boards, and is a Senior Editor for eLife. He is a Fellow of the AAAS and has received many awards, including several for teaching excellence.
Karen Brown has been a reporter at New England Public Radio since 1998, focusing primarily on health and mental health issues. She also freelances for NPR, The New York Times, The Boston Globe, NOVA Next, and other national outlets. Brown has produced several radio documentaries that address the effects of trauma, including "Life After Stress: The Biology of Trauma and Resilience," "Never Forget: Holocaust Survivors Contend With New Memories of Past Trauma," and "Love, War, and PTSD: Anna and Peter Mohan.” She was a 2015 Dart Center Ochberg Fellow, a 2012-13 MIT-Knight Fellow in Science Journalism and a 2004-5 Rosalynn Carter Fellow in Mental Health Journalism. She received a Master of Journalism from the University of California at Berkeley in 1996.