Building Bridges between large-scale brain initiatives
The purpose of this session is to bring together the neuroscience research infrastructure providers to discuss the gaps, challenges, and opportunities for pooling resources and tap into each other's user base, thereby expanding the impact within the research community. The session will be divided into 3 discussion sessions. Each discussion session will be introduced by a specific repository who will introduce their service and the topic of the discussion session (i.e. gaps). Following the introduction, a panel of 5 speakers representing other infrastructures present will discuss the topic.
Who You’ll Be Hearing From
This session brings together expert voices from across the EBRAINS community and beyond. Discover the people sharing their insights, research, and perspectives on the topic.
Jean-Baptiste (JB) Poline, PhD, is a tenured Professor in the Department of Neurology and Neurosurgery, and at the School of Computer Science at McGill; the director of the ORIGAMI (https://neurodatascience.github.io/) neuro-data-science laboratory where the Neurobagel (https://neurobagel.org) and Nipoppy (https://nipoppy.readthedocs.io/en/latest/) projects are developed. He is a strong proponent of open and reproducible science, founded or co-founded two scientific journals, works with several groups on training (ReproNim, Neurohackademy, etc) or standardization (GA4GH, INCF) initiatives, chaired the International Neuroinformatics Coordinating Facility scientific council, Chaired the NeuroHub and Technical Steering Committee for the Canadian Open Neuroscience Platform at the Neuro. Among the early pioneers of functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), today, Prof. Jean-Baptiste Poline is a leading researcher in the fields of neuroimaging, imaging genetics, data science and neuroinformatics technologies and works with several initiative worldwide to develop open, reproducible, and efficient neuroimaging research.
Maryann Martone is professor emerita at the University of California, San Diego and maintains an active laboratory, the FAIR Data Informatics Lab. She started her career as a neuroanatomist, specializing in light and electron microscopy, but her main research for the past 20 years focused on informatics for neuroscience, i.e., neuroinformatics. She led the Neuroscience Information Framework, a national project to establish a uniform resource description framework for neuroscience, and the NIDDK Information Network (dkNET), a portal for connecting researchers in digestive, kidney and metabolic disease to data, tools and materials.
Mathew Birdsall Abrams, PhD, MPH is Director of Science and Training at the International Neuroinformatics Coordinating Facility (INCF), a global organization dedicated to open, FAIR, and citable neuroscience. Mathew is a neuroscientist with over 25 years of experience in both experimental neuroscience and clinical psychiatry, as well as 12 years of experience in community coordination, community building, and product development in neuroinformatics. Mathew has worked with the infrastructure developers of the world’s large scale brain initiatives (BRAIN Initiative in US, Human Brain Project in Europe, Canadian Open Neuroscience Platform, and Brain/MINDS in Japan). He also holds Positions of Trust in many neuroscience societies (e.g. SfN, FUN, FENS, and IBRO). Mathew conducted his doctoral thesis research at Tulane University and Karolinska Institutet, obtained his MPH in Health Systems Management at Tulane University School of Public Health and Tropical Medicine, and completed his undergraduate education at the University of Richmond.
Prof. Jan Bjaalie is Chief Data and Knowledge Officer at the EBRAINS AISBL and leader of the Data Services of the EBRAINS Research Infrastructure. Since 2023, he is Dean of Research and Innovation at the Faculty of Medicine, University of Oslo. He is a professor of anatomy and neuroscience at the Institute of Basic Medical Science and Head of the Norwegian Neuroinformatics Node. His previous roles include Head of the Institute of Basic Medical Sciences at the University of Oslo (2009-2016), founding Executive Director of the International Neuroinformatics Coordinating Facility (INCF) at Karolinska Institute (2006-2008), Chair of the INCF Governing Board (2013-2016), and Co-Chair of the International Brain Initiative (2019-2020). Within the EU flagship Human Brain Project, he was the Neuroinformatics Platform Leader (2017–2020) and Infrastructure Director (2018–2022). His research group has focused on sensory map transformations, wiring patterns in the brain, and developing data systems for organising and managing neuroscience research data using next-generation digital brain atlases. Jan Bjaalie is the Chief Editor of Frontiers in Neuroinformatics and former Section Editor for Brain Structure and Function.
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