Bio:
Dr. Arumugam has expertise in micro-nanofabrication of electrodes, biological and neurochemical sensor technologies, electroanalytical chemistry, microfluidics and surface science of carbon nanomaterials. His research focuses on the development of metal modified carbon nanotube (CNT) and nanodiamond composite microelectrodes to monitor neurochemicals electrochemically. Current area of application of his research is in the detection of neurochemicals using custom-modified platinum microelectrode arrays.

Bio:
Dr. DeCoster' research focuses on cellular neuroscience, especially in the areas of brain cell signaling. For this REU project, Dr. DeCoster will work jointly with Dr. Evans' team toward the acquisition of live brain cell signaling dynamics and subsequent simulation and analysis of molecular and cellular networks.

Bio:
Dr. Evans has expertise in distributed parameter control modeling and simulation, numerical analysis, dynamic modeling of physical systems, and STEM education research. For this REU project, Dr. Evans will work jointly with Dr. DeCoster's team toward the modeling and simulation of dynamic molecular and cellular networks.

Bio:
Dr. Levi Good is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Biomedical Engineering at Louisiana Tech University. He received his PhD from Arizona State University in 2007 with an emphasis on seizure prediction and control using deep brain stimulation in a rodent model of epilepsy. Dr. Good continued his training through postdoctoral fellowships at Barrow Neurological Institute in Phoenix, AZ and in the Department of Neurology and Neurotherapeutics at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center in Dallas, TX. He then served as the Scientific Director of the In Vivo Neurophysiology Core Facility at UTSW before joining Louisiana Tech. Dr. Good’s Neural Systems Lab at Louisiana Tech focuses on research in neuromodulation for seizure prevention and using advanced signal processing to assess the consequences of mild traumatic brain injury on neural function.

Bio:
Dr. Iasemidis is a world renowned expert in nonlinear dynamics and the development of new measures of dynamics for the detection, prediction and control of crises in complex coupled systems, in particular the animal and human epileptic brain. His research and over 100 peer-reviewed publications, interdisciplinary conference organizations, presentations and invited talks have stimulated an international interest in the prediction and control of epileptic seizures and understanding of the mechanisms of epileptogenesis. He is considered one of the founders of the field of seizure prediction. Dr. Iasemidis served on the editorial board of Epilepsia and the IEEE Transactions on Biomedical Engineering, and currently is on the editorial board of the Annals of Biomedical Engineering and the International Journal of Neural Systems. He is a reviewer for a score of journals and research sponsoring national and international agencies, including the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and the National Science Foundation (NSF). Over the years, Dr. Iasemidis' research has been funded by NIH, VA, DARPA, NSF, DoD, the Epilepsy Foundation of America, the Science Foundation of Arizona, the Whitaker Foundation and industry. He has co-founded three companies in the area of neuromodulation and control of epilepsy and is the co-author of 4 awarded, 2 pending and 9 provisional patents in this area. His research has been highlighted on multiple forums, including the New York Times, Discover magazine, the Teaching Company, and the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS). Dr. Iasemidis is a Fellow of the American Institute of Medical and Biological Engineers (AIMBE) and the National Academy of Inventors.

Bio:
Dr. Murray is the Director of the Integrated Neuroscience and Imaging (INI) Lab at Louisiana Tech University. During her graduate studies at Arizona State University, Dr. Murray’s research focused on cellular neuroscience, molecular biology, and recording electrical activity of brain cell networks (electrophysiology). During her postdoctoral research at Yale University, she designed miniature, implantable lenses to image deep into the brain of live mice. Her current projects in the INI Lab use leading edge, multiphoton microscopy, electrophysiology (with Dr. Good and Dr. Iasemidis’ labs), neurochemical microbiosensors (with Dr. Arumugam’s lab) and custom-designed tools to detect changes in brain structure and activity in mice and rats with brain injuries or disorders, such as epilepsy.

Bio:
Dr. Siddiqui has expertise in mathematical, analytical and computational modeling of carbon nanomaterials. Her research focuses on studies of electrical and chemical properties of carbon nanomaterial enabled electrodes for applications in biological, neurochemical sensing and energy storage. Her other interests include physics education and development of educational tools for teaching of quantum mechanics.

Bio:
Kirk St.Amant is a Professor and the Eunice C. Williamson Endowed Chair in Technical Communication at Louisiana Tech University (USA), and he is also an Adjunct Professor of International Health and Medical Communication with the University of Limerick (Ireland). His main research interests are international communication and information design for global audiences with a particular focus on the globalization of online education and health and medical communication for international audiences. He has taught online and hybrid courses for universities in Belize, Denmark, Finland, Ireland, Ukraine, and the United States.

Bio:
Dr. Escalona has expertise in the area of biomedical signal processing, where she has applied new techniques for electrophysiological signal analysis from large sensor arrays. Her research focuses on statistical signal modeling and estimation from electroencephalographic (EEG) and magnetoencephalographic (MEG) arrays for brain source activity localization, signal processing for resting-state and task-related brain activity and connectivity in the brain. Dr. Escalona has also contributed novel techniques to improve the extraction, quantification, and characterization of EEG, MEG and fetal MEG (fMEG) signals.

Bio:
Dr. Gess is a Board Certified Clinical Neuropsychologist with extensive experience in patients with epilepsy, brain injury, movement disorders, brain neoplasm, dementia, multiple sclerosis, and other neurodegenerative conditions. Before joining UAMS Dr. Gess was on the faculty at Emory University Department of Rehabilitation Medicine in Atlanta. She received her doctorate in neuropsychology from Georgia State University in Atlanta. She completed a clinical internship in neuropsychology at University of Arizona College of Medicine in Phoenix, and a post-doctoral fellowship in clinical neuropsychology from Emory University. Her research interests include the prediction of post-surgical cognitive outcome following elective neurosurgical procedures and the study of intervention models for cognitive recovery. Dr. Gess's ongoing projects focus on the integration of neuropsychology and functional neuroimaging for assessment and treatment of individual clinical populations and determination of the level of care a person may require in future months and years following treatment. In addition to her clinical work and research, Dr. Gess is the Director of Training for the Psychology Internship program at UAMS and serves on two national boards (the Educational Advisory Committee of the American Psychological Associations Division of Neuropsychology, and the Ethics Committee of the American Board of Clinical Neuropsychology).

Bio:
Dr. Larson-Prior has a background in functional neuroimaging, using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) and high-density electroencephalography (hdEEG) to study sleep in normal adult human volunteers and electrocorticography (ECoG) to study sleep and wake behavior in epilepsy patients undergoing invasive monitoring preparatory for resection surgery. In keeping with the laboratory's general interest in brain neurodynamics, particularly as it relates to state changes in the brain, summer projects will focus on changes in cognitive function and their relationship to sleep/wake behavior in adult subjects undergoing monitoring prior to respective surgery for intractable epilepsy.

Bio:
Dr. Gawne is an M.I.T. trained electrical engineer who applies engineering techniques to investigating the systems level functioning of the nervous system, with an especial focus on the cerebral cortex. He is currently using magnetoencephalography ("MEG") to explore brain rhythms and functional connectivity in normal brains, as well as in the brains of patients with epilepsy and schizophrenia.

Bio:
Dr. Martin is an Associate Professor in the Department of Neuropsychology at the University of Alabama Medical Center at Birmingham (UAB). He holds expertise in clinical neuropsychology as it relates to epilepsy and functional neurological disorders. He performs pre- and post-operative surgery evaluations with epilepsy and Parkinson's disease populations. He is an expert in evaluating various components of memory, focusing on acquisition, attention and recall. Dr. Martin will be primarily responsible for the spectrum of neuropsychological memory testing conducted pre-operatively and during MEG recordings (pre- and two times in post-operative periods) and intracranial EEG evaluation.

Bio:
Dr. Mohamed is a fellowship trained pediatric epilepsy neurologist with a clinical and research focus on patients with difficult-to- treat childhood epilepsy. The evaluation process includes mapping cerebral cortex involved in seizure evolution and delineating parts of the brain involved in important cognitive functions. Dr. Mohamed's research focuses on the utilization of computational methods on magnetoencephalography ("MEG") recordings to explore brain rhythms during cognitive processing, seizures as well the effect of seizures on the developing brain.