CARE News

INSAR Lifetime Achievement and Dissertation Award!

By ChloeMay 4th, 2021
Our Director, Dr. Helen Tager-Flusberg, is accepting the Lifetime Achievement Award from INSAR today during the annual meeting. The awards ceremony begins at 4pm!
Helen will be giving a short talk, which we will share when it is available. In addition, a former graduate student and current research scientist in the lab, Dr. Sophie Schwartz, is being honored this afternoon with a Dissertation Award and will also be speaking.
We'll share whatever we can once available, but for now- you can register for INSAR as a community member here (https://www.autism-insar.org/event/insar2021), and you can see Helen's and Sophie's names featured in this list (https://www.autism-insar.org/page/RecognitionAwards).
We are so fortunate to be directed and joined by such wonderful scientists here at CARE!
Update: you can view Helen's Lifetime Achievement Award speech here!

Farewell, Jenn!

By ChloeApril 15th, 2021

We've been so lucky to have Jenn Leano work here at CARE for four amazing years! This past week was her last week-- Jenn has taken a position as Clinical Research Program Coordinator with Dr. Megan Ranney's team at Brown University, Lifespan Center for Digital Health.  We all wish her well in her new role!

We surprised her at our lab meeting last week with a little video that Emily put together, and fun was had by all. I can't share the video, so the above still from it will have to suffice.

Jenn, we hope you have lots of fun at Brown, we know you'll do amazing things, and we'll miss you tons!

Want to work at CARE? We’re looking for a post-doc!

By ChloeApril 13th, 2021

 

Post-Doctoral Research Fellowship

The Center for Autism Research Excellence (CARE) at Boston University has an immediate opening for a full time post-doctoral fellow for a 2-year term to work on a variety of ongoing research programs that explore early brain and behavioral development in autism, with a focus on language and social cognition.  We are looking for an energetic scientist who has a strong research background in development and autism (or related neurodevelopmental disorders), some technical and programming expertise, and experience collecting and analyzing clinical, behavioral and electrophysiological (EEG/ERP) data.

 

The Post-Doctoral Fellow will have primary responsibilities in supporting new and ongoing research programs.  Responsibilities include:

  • Training and supervision of students and other project staff
  • Data collection including both standardized behavioral assessments and EEG/ERP measures
  • EEG/ERP and behavioral data processing and analyses
  • Write-up and dissemination of findings for reports, conference presentations and peer-reviewed publications

 

Required Qualifications:

  • Ph.D. in Psychology, Cognitive Science, Neuroscience or related fields
  • Experience working with children in research settings, preferably including individuals with ASD
  • Training in two or more of the following areas: cognitive science/cognitive neuroscience, neuroimaging/electrophysiology, developmental sciences; autism research
  • Programming skills (e.g., MATLAB; Python) and proficiency with statistical programs and analyses (e.g., R, SPSS)
  • Excellent interpersonal leadership skills, writing, and organizational skills
  • Strong record of scholarly accomplishments

 

Salaries and benefits are competitive. Boston University offers active support and professional training programs to post-doctoral fellows (https://www.bu.edu/postdocs/). Interested candidates should send a CV, cover letter, research statement and contact information for three professional references to Helen Tager-Flusberg, Ph.D. (htagerf@bu.edu) and Chloe Adams Agarwal (CARE Administrator – chloeaa@bu.edu).

 

To learn more about our work please visit our website:

http://www.bu.edu/autism

World Autism Awareness Day

By ChloeApril 7th, 2021

On World Autism Awareness Day, we celebrate the countless ways that people with autism contribute to our families, our communities, our Nation, and the world, and we shine a light on the systemic barriers people with autism face in their daily lives.

You can read the full proclamation from the White House here.

Celebrating Dr. Barokova!!

By ChloeMarch 25th, 2021

Last week, one of our doctoral students, Mihaela Barokova, defended her dissertation successfully and earned her PhD! Tomorrow, the newly-minted Doctor is giving a talk to the Infant Brain Imaging Study (IBIS) Network to talk about her ELSA protocol for language assessment and communication in ASD! She had another invited talk earlier in the month- March has been a very big month for our Dr. Barokova!! You can read both of her 2020 publications here.

INSAR 20th Anniversary!

By ChloeMarch 15th, 2021

The International Society for Autism Research (INSAR) has their 20th anniversary conference this year!! To celebrate the milestone, INSAR staff interviewed some of the board and committee members, Lifetime Achievement awardees, and fellows. One of the Lifetime Achievement awardees they interviewed was our very own director, Dr. Tager-Flusberg! You can watch her interview, and see more, on this website!!

Diagnosing Autism in the Pandemic

By ChloeMarch 4th, 2021
Our POLO study collaborator, Dr. Lord, was interviewed by the New York Times for this piece on ASD diagnosis during the pandemic. For any that aren’t familiar with her name, Dr. Lord is the creator of the ADOS, the current gold-standard tool for ASD diagnosis.
The ADOS can’t be done as effectively while masked, because the child and examiner need to be able to clearly see each other’s faces, expressions, and reactions during the assessment- you can read more about diagnosis during the pandemic in this New York Times article!

Cocktail Party Effect Review

By ChloeMarch 2nd, 2021

Dr. Sophie Schwartz's "Cocktail party effect" research regarding neural response to names in noisy settings was just reviewed by Autism Advocate Parenting Magazine for their March issue! We think this is a great summary of this fascinating work. Dr. Schwartz explored how neural responses to names (one's own name, and strangers' names) differ between verbal and minimally-verbal individuals with ASD in both quiet settings and noisy settings. You can read their review here, and read Dr. Schwartz's paper here!

Facebook Live Event!

By ChloeJanuary 18th, 2021
Join us as we discuss YOUR role in Autism Research on Facebook Live! This Wednesday at 7pm EST.
We are going to discuss two Autism research studies currently being conducted by our center. Join our very own Sophie and Rachel to learn more about our POLO and ATLAS projects!
Dr. Sophie Schwartz is a postdoctoral research fellow at CARE and a senior project manager for the Predicting and Optimizing Language Outcomes research program. She received her PhD in Computational Neuroscience from Boston University in 2019 and has focused for over a decade on the study of individuals with autism who have language impairments or are minimally verbal.
Rachel is a Project Coordinator at CARE, which means she is in charge of managing current research studies – from planning and coordinating to implementation. She is currently running the Caregiver Interview Study. Rachel has a background in neuroscience, education, and psychology, having received her Bachelor’s of Science in Neurobiology from the University of Washington and her Master’s in Education in Mind, Brain, and Education from the Harvard Graduate School of Education. She has worked in multiple psychology labs working with folks with autism, studying social, behavioral, and communication outcomes in infants through adolescents.