CAREER: Neuro-navigation guided non-invasive brain stimulation for individualized precision rehabilitation in stroke

该项目的目标是推进中风后大脑功能变化的科学研究，并开创适合每个人需求的量身定做的康复策略。中风后的运动障碍是这个国家成年人残疾的主要原因。由于缺乏对脑功能变化的足够了解来指导临床实践，常规治疗并不是对每个人都是最佳的。该项目寻求结合不同的成像方法来引导对大脑的电刺激，以改善运动的恢复。该项目的成果有可能广泛推进中风或脑损伤的研究，以帮助每年接受康复治疗的50多万人。这将降低中风和其他类似脑损伤导致的长期残疾的医疗和护理成本。通过该项目的教育活动，将构建一个多学科的研究-教育生态系统，将工科学生、临床医生实习生和STEM教育工作者联系起来，促进下一代康复先驱的教育。尽管许多人努力开发脑损伤后运动康复的新技术，从脑成像到神经调节方法，但由于缺乏为每个人量身定做康复策略的成像指导和实时神经反馈，最佳恢复仍然有限。该项目将解决这一限制，并建立一个独特的康复工程研究范式，基于新的多模式脑成像方法和闭环系统高清晰度经颅直流电刺激(HD-tDCS)平台。这一新方法将准确评估受伤大脑中运动控制的变化，并识别关键网络，以实现更精确的HD-tdcs刺激。研究人员将采用集成的实验和计算方法来：1)识别和表征用于受伤脑内运动控制的个性化脑网络；2)建模和评估HD-tDCS对“活”脑的动态影响，以实现对脑网络的定向、精确刺激；以及3)开发闭环系统成像和神经反馈引导的HD-tDC，以改善脑功能和行为结果。这一跨学科项目将与教育和外联活动相结合，以提高对工程学和康复科学之间相互依存关系的认识，并促进对下一代康复工程师的跨学科教育和培训，其教育目标有三个：1)通过暑期研究培训促进工程和物理治疗专业学生的参与；2)通过培训高中教师，将康复工程知识转化为适合年级的STEM教育；3)通过博物馆活动提高公众对工程学对康复的贡献的认识。该项目由残疾和康复工程计划和既定的激励竞争性研究计划(EPSCoR)共同资助。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力优势和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

The goal of this project is to advance the scientific study of brain functional changes after a stroke and pioneer a tailored rehabilitation strategy that fits each individual’s needs. Movement impairments following a stroke are a major cause of adult disability in this country. The routine treatment is not yet optimal for every individual due to a lack of sufficient understanding of brain functional changes to inform clinical practice. This project seeks to combine different imaging methods to guide electrical stimulation to the brain that improves the recovery of movement. The outcomes of this project have the potential to advance stroke or brain injury research broadly to help over half a million people who undergo rehabilitation each year. This will reduce the healthcare and nursing costs for long-term disability caused by stroke and other similar brain injuries. Through education activities in this project, a multi-disciplinary research-education “eco-system” will be built to connect engineering students, clinician trainees, and STEM educators to promote the education of next-generation rehabilitation pioneers. Despite numerous efforts to develop new technologies for movement rehabilitation post-brain injuries, from brain imaging to neuromodulation approaches, optimal recovery is still limited due to a lack of imaging guidance and real-time neurofeedback to tailor rehabilitation strategies for each individual. This project will address this limitation and establish a unique rehabilitation engineering research paradigm based on a novel multi-modal brain imaging approach and a closed-loop high-definition transcranial direct current stimulation (HD-tDCS) platform. This new approach will precisely assess the changes to motor control in an injured brain and identify the key network to target for more precise HD-tDCS stimulation. The investigator will take integrated experimental and computational approaches to: 1) Identify and characterize individualized brain networks for movement control in injured brains; 2) Model and evaluate the dynamic effect of HD-tDCS on a “live” brain to enable targeted, precision stimulation of brain networks; and 3) Develop closed-loop imaging and neurofeedback guided HD-tDCS to improve brain function and behavior outcomes. This interdisciplinary project will be integrated with education and outreach activities to promote awareness of interdependencies between engineering and rehabilitation sciences and promote interdisciplinary education and training for next-generation rehabilitation engineers, with three educational objectives: 1) Promote the engagement of engineering and physical therapy students via summer research training, 2) Translate rehabilitation engineering knowledge to grade-appropriate STEM education via training high school teachers, and 3) Increase public awareness of engineering’s contributions to rehabilitation via museum events.This project is jointly funded by the Disability and Rehabilitation Engineering Program and the Established Program to Stimulate Competitive Research (EPSCoR).This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.