IGERT: Integrating New Technologies with Cognitive Neuroscience

这个综合研究生教育和研究培训（IGERT）项目将为卡内基梅隆大学和匹兹堡大学的认知神经基础中心（CNBC）提供的现有跨学科培训计划开发新的方向。11个博士项目正式隶属于该项目，该项目培养年轻科学家用跨学科的方法来理解认知过程是如何从神经机制中产生的。新计划的一半涉及实验神经科学的新技术，例如，光学、磁共振和脑磁成像方法用于功能性脑成像，以及使用先进的统计和数据可视化算法分析神经元群体活动模式。互补的一半涉及系统和认知神经科学在技术开发中的应用，如神经假体、神经控制和认知机器人等领域。目前CNBC IGERT项目最成功的方面将被保留：共同的核心课程，使用来自不同学科的多名顾问，以及选择资助学生的竞争性提案程序。该项目将培养一批新的科学家，以实现新技术与认知和系统神经科学研究的最大可能整合。它还将补充卡内基梅隆大学（Carnegie Mellon）与斯佩尔曼学院（Spelman College）合作的一项新举措，即在几所历史悠久的黑人学院和大学开设认知机器人本科课程，从而增加少数族裔申请CNBC等研究生项目的人数。IGERT是一项nsf范围内的计划，旨在满足教育美国博士科学家和工程师的挑战，他们具有跨学科背景，所选学科的深厚知识，以及未来职业需求所需的技术，专业和个人技能。该计划旨在通过建立创新的研究生教育和培训模式，在一个超越传统学科界限的合作研究的肥沃环境中，促进研究生教育的文化变革。

This Integrative Graduate Education and Research Training (IGERT) project will develop new directions for an existing cross-disciplinary training program offered by the Center for the Neural Basis of Cognition (CNBC) at Carnegie Mellon University and the University of Pittsburgh. Eleven doctoral programs are formally affiliated with the program, which trains young scientists in interdisciplinary approaches to understanding how cognitive processes arise from neural mechanisms. One half of the new initiative concerns new technologies for experimental neuroscience, e.g., optical, magnetic resonance, and magnetoencephalographic approaches to functional brain imaging, and analysis of neuronal population activity patterns using advanced statistical and data visualization algorithms. The complementary half concerns the applications of systems and cognitive neuroscience to technology development, in areas such as neural prostheses, neural control, and cognitive robotics. The most successful aspects of the current CNBC IGERT program will be retained: a common core curriculum, use of multiple advisors from different disciplines, and a competitive proposal process for selecting students for funding.The project will train a new breed of scientists to achieve the fullest possible integration of new technologies into cognitive and systems neuroscience research. It will also complement a new initiative at Carnegie Mellon, in collaboration with Spelman College, to establish undergraduate courses in cognitive robotics at several historically black colleges and universities, thereby increasing the pool of minority applicants to graduate programs such as the CNBC program. IGERT is an NSF-wide program intended to meet the challenges of educating U.S. Ph.D. scientists and engineers with the interdisciplinary background, deep knowledge in a chosen discipline, and the technical, professional, and personal skills needed for the career demands of the future. The program is intended to catalyze a cultural change in graduate education by establishing innovative new models for graduate education and training in a fertile environment for collaborative research that transcends traditional disciplinary boundaries.