Upgrade of 3 Tesla magnetic resonance imaging system

点击翻译按钮获取中文摘要

Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) is a key research tool in the cognitive neurosciences and is critical for developing an understanding of the human brain in both health and disease. MRI allows for non-invasive, whole-brain measurements that inform us about brain function as well as brain structure. The Neuroimaging Centre at the Technische Universität Dresden was established in 2006 when the currently used 3 Tesla MRI was commissioned. Over the last 14 years, this MRI machine has enabled research groups at the faculties of psychology and medicine to perform internationally competitive, cognitive neuroscience research. MRI is also the key measurement technique within several large-scale funding initiatives, such as two collaborative research centres (SFB 940 and TRR 265), and a wide range of individual project grants. Based on these ongoing funding initiatives, we will focus on the overarching research question of delineating the mechanism of cognitive control and volition, both in health and disease. In particular, using interlinked computational and experimental studies, we will establish a theoretical framework of how the brain dynamically exerts cognitive control and uses meta-control to rapidly adapt its action selection between different tasks and changing contexts. We will use this framework to develop mechanistic accounts of addictive behaviour, dysfunctional learning processes, the development of maladaptive habits and impaired cognitive control such as response inhibition failures and more generally failures in forward planning during action selection. The aim of this research program is to derive a mechanistic understanding of cognitive control, its failures in disease and to develop mechanism-based interventions for mental disorders.