Core C, the Neuroimaging/Neurophysiolgy Core, provides comprehensive services for acquisition, analysis, and integration of brain biomarker data from EEG, MRI, and eye tracking studies. There is a critical need to develop brain biomarkers of autism that are relevant across age ranges and severity level, and that are sensitive for detecting early brain abnormalities, developmental trajectories, and response to treatment. Each of the five Projects in the center will utilize services, resources and expertise provided by Core C to address specific aims and Center themes more generally. The Core will provide four main functions: 1) Subject preparation and desensitization; 2) implementing a common set of tasks across projects and modalities; 3) data acquisition, and 4) data analysis and integration with projects to address specific aims and facilitate cross-project collaborations. By centralizing these modalities within the same core we can provide a common set of measures, acquired consistently across subjects and methods, allowing us to integrate data in cross- project collaborations. Common tasks will address core themes including language acquisition, implicit (statistic) learning, and social attention. We have access to outstanding infrastructure and equipment resources for acquiring the core measures proposed: these are structural MRI, Diffusion Tensor Imaging (DTI) resting state MRI, functional MRI activation. Resting and activation EEG, eye tracking and pupillometry. The Core provides a team of experts in acquisition and analysis of these data. Further, the core will support several novel approaches to data analysis and integration including graph theoretical approaches to understand brain connectivity networks applied across modalities, and machine learning analytic approaches for predicting outcomes, groups, or phenotypic characteristics. Working in tandem with the statistics unit, the Core personnel will work with project and core investigators to integrate neuroimaging and neurophysiology findings with project-specific data to address both project aims and the ACE central themes.
Interagency Autism Coordinating Committee (IACC)
Autism Research Database (AFD)
