Background
These data and tutorials are part of a long-term initiative to develop an open-access online source for teaching of fMRI Data Analysis. The initiative stems from over 15 years of teaching of Psychology 9223: Neuroimaging of Cognition by Prof. Jody Culham at the Western University and the related popular web site, www.fmri4newbies.com.
Starting in 2017, funding from a $66M Canada First Research Excellence Fund (CFREF) BrainsCAN grant to Western University was committed to enable our team to take fMRI teaching “to the next level”. In 2017-18, BrainsCAN funded data collection and development of these tutorials by Western Computer Science PhD student Ethan Jackson, in consultation with Prof. Jody Culham of Western’s Department of Psychology, Brain and Mind Institute, and Neuroscience Program. In 2017-18, these tutorials will be beta-tested by a new group of 9223 students. Over the term of BrainsCAN, we hope to continue to develop, expand, and publicize this initiative.
Acknowledgments
We gratefully acknowledge CFREF funding and the support of the BrainsCAN executive committee and staff.
Tutorials utilize a free educational version of Brain Voyager (for Mac, PC or Unix/Linux) that works with the teaching data set. http://www.brainvoyager.com/ Brain Voyager offers an intuitive GUI-based cross-platform interface (for Mac, PC or Unix/Linux) that facilitates data exploration. Nevertheless, emphasis is on concepts that generalize across software platforms. We gratefully acknowledge support from the Brain Voyager development team, particularly Rainer Goebel and Armin Heinecke.
Programmer Kevin Stubbs provided invaluable help in data processing and troubleshooting. MRI Facility Manager Joe Gati, MR technologist Scott Charlton, and Sr. MRI Research Technologist Trevor Szekeres advised on data collection. Tutorial development benefitted from contributions from earlier ad hoc tutorials developed by previous 9223 teaching assistants: Ken Valyear, Samantha Podrabarec, Scott Macdonald, and Ed O’Neil. It also benefitted from example tutorials developed by the Psychology 9223 class of Fall 2017. We hope that future students and collaborators will help us improve and extend the tutorials.
Future Directions
Over the term of BrainsCAN, we anticipate the following developments:
1) Students in Psychology 9223 will continue to develop new tutorials, particularly for advanced concepts. In addition, we hope that some students will help us convert existing tutorials to other common software packages (particularly FSL, SPM, and AFNI).
2) New data sets will be added.
3) New interactive exercises will be added.
4) Rainer Goebel and Jody Culham have signed a contract with Psychology Press to produce a traditional textbook aimed at the level of senior undergraduates and graduate students learning fMRI. Like the course and this web site, the course will be built upon fundamentals of data structure, the general linear model, and with less emphasis on advanced MRI physics.
5) A more in-depth eBook is being considered to provide a more dynamic and specific forum for teaching fMRI.
6) We will reach out to others who involved in fMRI teaching to expand and popularize the initiative. As empirical neuroimaging has begun to emphasize
Can you help?
If you have suggestions about how to improve the tutorials and expand the initiative, please contact us.
Ethan Jackson jackson.ethan.c <at> gmail.com
Jody Culham jculham <at> uwo.ca