Anna Blazejewska holds two master’s degrees, in philosophy (cognitive science) and in computer science. Her PhD work at Sir Peter Mansfield Imaging Center in Nottingham focused on investigating brain tissue properties with high resolution 7T MRI including quantitative analysis of iron- and myelin-related MR contrasts as well as correlations of the ex vivo MRI data with histology. During the first two years of her postdoctoral training she was studying the changes of T2* relaxation times due to tissue maturation in healthy developing fetal brain and their impact on protocol optimization for fetal fMRI. In late 2015 Anna joined A. A. Martinos Center for Biomedical Imaging at MGH as a post-doctoral fellow where she has been working on improving the performance of parallel imaging techniques for functional MRI at ultra-high field strengths, developing anatomically informed intracortical smoothing methods for high spatial resolution fMRI and investigating spatial specificity of the early positive BOLD fMRI response across cortical depths. The goal of Anna’s K99/R00 project is to develop a model of microanatomical and microvascular features of cortical brain tissue using ex vivo and in vivo MRI and histology stains to help remove confounding factors and make fMRI measurements more specific to neuronal activity.
Read the RFAs:
- BRAIN Initiative Advanced Postdoctoral Career Transition Award to Promote Diversity (K99/R00 Independent Clinical Trial Not Allowed)
- BRAIN Initiative Advanced Postdoctoral Career Transition Award to Promote Diversity (K99/R00 Independent Clinical Trial Required)
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