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How much brain power do you use when you perform a task? That’s what Dr. Bart Rypma is trying to understand in his research at UTD Center for Brain Health, and the answer has important implications for healthy aging. In studying how much neural activity our short-term memory requires to carry out the business of our days, Dr. Rypma has learned that less is more. “People typically think that in neural activity, more means better,” he says. “But it may be more accurate to think in terms of efficiency—whether the brain is doing more work cognitively with fewer neural resources.” It seems that as we get older, we require more neural activity in the prefrontal cortex than younger people to perform cognitive tasks. Now the question is – “why?” Dr. Rypma recently received a grant from the National Institutes of Health to study the physiological bases of age-related changes in short-term memory. “I hope my work helps in the development of therapies that target specific neural systems and vascular systems to improve the quality of life of older adults,” he explains. We are currently working on several studies, click the links below to learn more. Mild Cognitive Impairment (MCI) - a comprehensive investigation of the neural bases of working memory decline in Mild Cognitive Impairment (MCI) by using neuroimaging and Diffusion Tensor Imaging (DTI) to understand both the brain function and brain structure to memory declines in MCI. Multiple
Sclerosis (MS) - comprehensive investigation
of the neural basis for Multiple Sclerosis by using neuroimaging
and behavorial techniques to characterize the structural,
functional and Gulf War Illness (GWI) - investigation of the neural bases of cognitive impairment due to GWI Auditory Cognitive Neuroscience - behavioral and fMRI studies of auditory perception and memory, with a focus on speech and music, in normal human cognition. Topics include auditory memory distortion, priming of musical sounds, recognition of speech and music, and working memory for mainstream and underground music.
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