NPR Lab 2012-13
NPR Bios
After receiving his PhD in experimental psychology from Georgia Tech, Dr. Rypma did postdoctoral work focusing on neural imaging at Stanford and the University of Pennsylvania. He also brings his expertise in fMRI (functional magnetic resonance imaging) to UT Southwestern Medical Center (UTSW), and he has been appointed by Dean Bert Moore as the faculty liaison between UT Dallas and UTSW. Dr. Rypma came to the Center from Rutgers University. “I had never imagined myself living in Dallas, Texas, but once I came here and saw all the resources being committed to neuroscience, I knew it was a good place for me,” he says. “Neuroscience isn’t something you can do in a small way. It has to be done big, and it has to be done right, so I was really impressed with Center for Brain Health, UT Dallas, and UTSW.” Dr. Rypma’s research is aimed at exploring the cognitive and neurobiological mechanisms of human memory and how those mechanisms are affected by aging and disease. He uses functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) to observe the activity of younger and older adults as they perform cognitive tasks. fMRI is still a relatively new method for studying brain activity and much work remains to be done to perfect it, especially when comparing different populations like young and old. Thus, one focus of Dr. Rypma’s work has been the development of fMRI experimental methods to facilitate cross-population comparisons of neural activity. He has published extensively cognitive and neurobiological mechanisms of human memory, including high-profile publications in Proceedings of the National Academy of Science, Nature Neuroscience, Cortex, and Neuroimage. Click here for his Biographical Sketch.
Dr. Ilana J. Bennett is currently a Postdoctoral Research Fellow in Dr. Bart Rypmas lab at the Center for Brain Health and the School of Behavioral and Brain Sciences at the University of Texas at Dallas and at the Department of Psychiatry at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center. She received a PhD in Psychology with a concentration in Lifespan Cognitive Neuroscience from Georgetown University in 2009. For the past 8 years, her research has focused on cognitive and neurobiological changes associated with healthy aging with an emphasis on understanding the neural mechanisms underlying age-related differences in learning and memory.
Dr. Joanna Hutchison is currently working as a Postdoctoral
Research Fellow with Dr. Bart Rypma at the Center for BrainHealth
and the School of Behavioral and Brain Sciences at the University
of Texas at Dallas and at the Department of Psychiatry at
the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center.
Ryan Brigante is a Ph.D. student in Cognition and Neuroscience at UT Dallas. He received his B.A. in Psychology summa cum laude from UT San Antonio. Ryan’s current research focuses on auditory cognitive neuroscience, the study of mental and neural processes underlying perception and memory of sounds, especially music. Research is examining when auditory memories become distorted, how auditory representations change over time, and how perceptual and conceptual aspects of sound contribute to memory. Neuroimaging (fMRI) studies are being conducted to examine the neural correlates of these phenomena. Ryan is interested in theoretical and philosophical issues in cognitive science. An emerging perspective is known as “embodied cognition” or “grounded cognition.” According to this view, abstract functions of the mind are shaped by the structure and functions of the physical body. A further claim is that the mind is directly coupled with the local environment, and cognitive functions emerge out of adaptations and interactions with the world. This theory prescribes a paradigm for cognitive science that gives proper credence to the interconnectedness of brain, body, and world.Research Interests: Auditory cognitive neuroscience, Music cognition, Embodied cognition, Consciousness, Theoretical cognitive science
Nicholas Hubbard is a Ph.D. student, research assistant, and study coordinator working with Dr. Rypma. He received his Bachelor’s of Science from Michigan State University, where he studied Psychology. For the past 5 years, his work has focused on higher order cognition in psychiatric populations. This work has been utilized to better understand both the nature of psychiatric illness, as well as better inform researchers on the associated cognitive processes. Currently, Nicholas is pursuing projects examining fluid cognitive abilities in persons with: Depression, Gulf War Syndrome, and Multiple Sclerosis. These studies integrate both cognitive/neuropsychological testing and functional imaging, to aid researchers in better understanding the interactions between neural mechanisms and cognition. Research Interests: Cognitive processes in psychiatric illness, Models of working memory, Measurement of cognition, Functional magnetic resonance imaging of higher order cognitive processes.
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