![\"kilachand-center-mri-MWP-Perrachione-30_1640w\"](\"\/federal\/files\/2018\/02\/kilachand-center-mri-MWP-Perrachione-30_1640w.jpg\")
Neuroscientist Tyler Perrachione, who studies speech and language, is delighted with BU\u2019s new Siemens Prisma 3 Tesla MRI scanner in the Cognitive Neuroimaging Center at the Rajen Kilachand Center for Integrated Life Sciences and Engineering. Photo by Mira Whiting Photography.<\/em><\/p>\nNeuroscientist\u00a0Tyler Perrachione<\/a>, who studies speech and language, is starting a new research project\u2014decoding what the human brain is hearing when the person is listening to speech. The Sargent College of Health & Rehabilitation Sciences assistant professor of speech, language, and hearing sciences recently walked out of his office, crossed Commonwealth Avenue, and entered the\u00a0Rajen Kilachand Center for Integrated Life Sciences & Engineering<\/a>\u2019s\u00a0Cognitive Neuroimaging Center<\/a>\u00a0(CNC). There he spent two hours scanning a human subject\u2019s brain for the study using BU\u2019s new Siemens Prisma 3 Tesla MRI machine.<\/p>\n It was the first time Perrachione, director of the\u00a0Communication Neuroscience Research Laboratory<\/a>, didn\u2019t have to wait for the bus or call an Uber to schlep across the river to MIT\u2019s brain imaging center to do his scanning.<\/p>\n \u201cEverything went swimmingly and the computers are churning away at the data,\u201d says Perrachione, who was part of a small team of BU researchers who worked closely on the CNC with\u00a0Payette<\/a>, the Boston architectural firm that designed the\u00a0Kilachand Center<\/a>, at 610 Commonwealth Avenue.<\/p>\n Perrachione\u2019s enthusiasm is being echoed by other BU researchers who have been using the CNC\u2019s MRI scanner, on the center\u2019s first floor, since October. \u201cEveryone\u2019s been thrilled with the quality of the data they\u2019re getting,\u201d says CNC associate director\u00a0Jay Bohland<\/a>. \u201cIn addition to the scanner itself, we\u2019ve worked hard to put together the devices and tools necessary to support modern cognitive neuroscience, which depends on high-quality, precisely controlled stimulation and response recording.\u201d<\/p>\n Images of the human brain showing which parts are activated when a person is listening to words, from the scan of a human subject\u2019s brain that neuroscientist Tyler Perrachione ran recently using the 3 Tesla MRI machine at BU\u2019s new Cognitive Neuroimaging Center. The subject was listening to lists of monosyllabic words such as \u201cboot,\u201d \u201ctoad,\u201d \u201cdeck,\u201d and \u201cgive.\u201d Perrachione is collecting the data as part of his project to \u201cdecode\u201d how the brain recognizes the same word spoken by different people. His question: \u201cHow do brains know that words are the same, even when every person\u2019s speech has a unique sound?\u201d Images courtesy of Perrachione.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n The CNC is available to neuroscientists across the University, on both the Charles River Campus and the Medical Campus. \u201cWe\u2019re excited to welcome researchers who have been using imaging facilities at other Boston sites and new users who are interested in expanding their research to include neuroimaging methods,\u201d says CNC director\u00a0Chantal Stern<\/a>, a College of Arts & Sciences professor of psychological and brain sciences. Stern is the principal investigator of a\u00a0$1.6 million National Science Foundation grant<\/a>\u00a0that supports the scanner.<\/p>\n Bohland says the CNC team will work with investigators at the new brain imaging suite so that they can \u201cbecome comfortable with the equipment, center capabilities, and quality of data obtained before moving funded studies to the facility.\u201d<\/p>\n Sam Ling<\/a>, a CAS assistant professor of psychological and brain sciences, has been using the scanner to carry out research funded by the\u00a0National Institutes of Health<\/a>\u00a0aimed at \u201cunderstanding how our brains process what we see and the neural computations that allow us to alter that processing to cater to our moment-to-moment thoughts and desires,\u201d Ling says.<\/p>\n \u201cOur lab has totally embraced the scanner,\u201d he says. \u201cThe quality of the data we\u2019ve been acquiring is outstanding. We\u2019re already starting to write up manuscripts based on some of the results.\u201d<\/p>\n Perrachione explains why the CNC\u2019s scanner is an amazing tool for his research. \u201cFirst, it has a great signal-to-noise ratio, meaning that we can see the living, thinking brain in unprecedented detail,\u201d he says. \u201cSecond, it has a new technology called simultaneous multislice imaging, which is a fancy way of saying we can take an fMRI picture really, really fast\u2014up to four times faster than we used to. This means we can do scans that are quieter and get a lot more data in the same amount of time, which is really important when you\u2019re studying speech and hearing. Getting a lot more data in each scan means we can better understand how individual brains are working, rather than having to get an average of a lot of brains. This will help us develop a more personalized and sensitive understanding of brain function and its relationship to behavior and health.<\/p>\n \u201cBut what\u2019s really great is not just the scanner, but the whole research environment it\u2019s the anchor for,\u201d says Perrachione, whose research is funded by the NIH\u00a0National Institute on Deafness and Other Communication Disorders<\/a>\u00a0and the\u00a0Brain and Behavior Research Foundation<\/a>. \u201cThe imaging center is a collaborative community to foster new discoveries and new science, not just the device that takes the pictures, exciting as that is.\u201d<\/p>\n![\"MRI](\"http:\/\/www.bu.edu\/today\/files\/2018\/02\/MRI-Scans.jpg\")
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