Jekyll2026-04-03T10:24:38-04:00https://fim.nimh.nih.gov/feed.xmlSection on Functional Imaging MethodsThis is the webpage for the Section on Functional Imaging Methods at the National Institute of Mental Health.Section on Functional Imaging Methods2026 Gingerbread House Competition2025-12-20T00:00:00-05:002025-12-20T00:00:00-05:00https://fim.nimh.nih.gov/gingerbreadhouse_2026Every winter, the NIH Clinical Center puts on a gingerbread house competition. This competition began in 2004 by the Clinical Center Nursing Department to promote teamwork and holiday spirit between nursing units. Today, the competition has expanded to all Clinical Center staff. All entries recieve the same gingerbread house kit, but are encouraged to get creative, and votes are collected electronically for the best gingerbread house.

This year, SFIM entered with the MAGNET-ficent Ginger-BRAIN house. Led by post-doc Sharif Kronemer, the members of SFIM worked together to create a sugary 7T MRI. Although our candy scanner and completely anatomically accurate brain did not win a prize, much fun was had!

First image of the gingerbread house Second image of the gingerbread house Third image of the gingerbread house
The MAGNET-ficent Ginger-BRAIN house in action
]]>Section on Functional Imaging MethodsNIMH Training Day 20252025-09-25T00:00:00-04:002025-09-25T00:00:00-04:00https://fim.nimh.nih.gov/trainingday2025Each year, fellows at NIMH have the opportunity to share their work at the NIMH IRP Fellow's Training Day. Post-bacs and post-docs present posters and oral presentations to the NIMH community, giving them the opportunity to foster potential collaboration and build community within NIMH. This year, SFIM post-bacs presented the following posters at Training Day:

  • Cassie Levesque: Afterimages as a method of inducing perceptual reality monitoring errors
  • Esther Lin: Dissociating Feedforward and Feedback Processing of Illusory Face Detection using 7T fMRI
  • Marly Rubin: rt-cog: real-time fMRI monitoring of brain activity and cognitive processes
  • Plyfaa Suwanamalik-Murphy: Examining How Spontaneous Eye Measures Indicate Conscious and Unconscious Sensory Neural Processing
  • Stephanie Swegle: Characterizing CSF volume change as a function of brain activation and alertness at 7T

    • In addition to her poster, Plyfaa Suwanamalik-Murphy was also selected to give an oral presentation on her work with Sharif Kronemer, entitled "The Eyes Know What the Brain Hears."

    Plyfaa giving her Training Day Talk


    We're also excited to share that Sharif Kronemer was announced as the winner of the 2025 Julius Axelrod Memorial Fellowship for Basic Research. This award is presented to an outstanding IRP post-doctoral, research or clinical fellow with the goal of commemorating scientific achievements and facilitate their career growth and development. The winner of this award receives a supplement to help support ongoing research and a travel award.

    Sharif Kronemer - Axelrod Award
    ]]>    Section on Functional Imaging Methods    2026 NIMH FARE Awards2025-07-09T00:00:00-04:002025-07-09T00:00:00-04:00https://fim.nimh.nih.gov/fareawards2026SFIM post-doc Sharif Kronemer and former graduate student Samika Kumar were awarded the 2026 NIMH Fellows Award for Research Excellence (FARE). Fellows have the opportunity to submit an abstract to a blind study section; the top 25% of abstracts are selected as FARE winners. FARE winners receive a stipend for travel and the opportunity to present their research at the NIH Research Festival or an NIH Special Interest Group seminar series. Congratulations, Sharif and Samika!

    ]]>    Section on Functional Imaging Methods    SFIM heads to OHBM 20252025-06-18T00:00:00-04:002025-06-18T00:00:00-04:00https://fim.nimh.nih.gov/ohbm2025SFIM is off to Brisbane, Australia for OHBM 2025! This year, we have 5 posters:

  • Josh Dean and Burak Akin: #1355 - fMRI Correlates of Dynamic Low Frequency Photoplethysmography (PPG) and Arterial Pressure Measures
  • Javier Gonzalez-Castillo: #1375 - Multi-echo Functional Connectivity as an Evaluation Metric for Denoising
  • Josh Faskowitz: #1381 - Edge event organization across temporal categories
  • Dan Handwerker: #1527 - tedana: Expanding flexibility for multi-echo fMRI noise removal methods
  • Stephanie Swegle: #1990 - Towards mapping CSF volume change at high resolutions at 7T

    • If you're at OHBM, feel free to swing by and check them out, or email the authors if you have any additional questions.

    ]]>    Section on Functional Imaging Methods    Saying goodbye to Josh D.2025-06-13T00:00:00-04:002025-06-13T00:00:00-04:00https://fim.nimh.nih.gov/josh_d_goodbyeJosh and his mentor, Burak

    It's that time of year when we're sad to say goodbye to our post-bacs as they head off to their next steps. We had the chance to celebrate Josh over lunch as he heads off to University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine. We'll miss him terribly, but we're excited to see all the he accomplishes in medical school!

    ]]>    Section on Functional Imaging Methods    Using Illusions to Probe the Origins of Consciousness2024-10-21T00:00:00-04:002024-10-21T00:00:00-04:00https://fim.nimh.nih.gov/kronemer_scibitesIn October, Sharif Kronemer was interviewed for an NIH SciBite, where he got the opportunity to discuss his research on Consciousness. Check out the video, and if you want to learn more, you can see publications and presentations about this topic here.

    ]]>    Section on Functional Imaging Methods    Brain changes observed during pregnancy2024-10-01T00:00:00-04:002024-10-01T00:00:00-04:00https://fim.nimh.nih.gov/brain_changes_in_pregnancyA new paper in Nature Neuroscience with SFIM co-authors Josh Faskowitz and Dan Handwerker was recently published. This project, lead by Drs. Laura Pritschet and Emily Jacobs at the University of California, Santa Barbara, and Elizabeth Chrastil at the University of California, Irvine, tracked changes in brain structure and function, in addition to hormonal levels in a first-time mother from three weeks prior to conception to two years after giving birth to investigate how pregnancy impacts the brain. To learn more about this project, check out the NIH news post or read the paper yourself.

    ]]>    Section on Functional Imaging Methods    Sending Isabel, Tori and Megan off to grad school2024-08-01T00:00:00-04:002024-08-01T00:00:00-04:00https://fim.nimh.nih.gov/postbac_goodbyeGoodbye lunch

    It’s always bittersweet to say goodbye to our post-bacs as they head off to graduate school.

    Megan is off to a Clinical Psych PhD with Dr. Katie Insel, at Northwestern University, Isabel is heading to the University of Chicago to work with Dr. Monica Rosenberg in the Department of Psychology, and Tori is heading to Baylor College of Medicince for a Neuroscience PhD.

    We’re very sad to see them go, but incredibly excited to see all the amazing things that they’re going to accomplish.

    ]]>    Section on Functional Imaging Methods    Dan Handwerker on practiCal fMRI2024-07-24T00:00:00-04:002024-07-24T00:00:00-04:00https://fim.nimh.nih.gov/handwerker_practicalfmriDan Handwerker was recently interviewed on Coffee Break! a podcast by practiCal fMRI, where he discussed physiologic noise in fMRI. Highlights include discussions of nice-to-haves vs must-haves in terms of non-MRI data, multi-echo fMRI and quality control of fMRI data.

    ]]>    Section on Functional Imaging Methods    Peter Bandettini on BJKS2023-12-15T00:00:00-05:002023-12-15T00:00:00-05:00https://fim.nimh.nih.gov/bandettini_bjksPeter Bandettini was recently interviewed on the BJKS podcast, where he discussed the history, present and future of fMRI. Other highlights include Peter’s advice to PhD students and post-docs.

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