The Second Iranian Symposium on the Brain Mapping Updates, the biggest event of brain mapping field, October 2018

NBML held the Second Iranian Symposium on the Brain Mapping Updates (ISBM 2018) with the aims of more convergent development of science and technology in brain mapping and to update researchers and scientists information of this area at the conference hall of the central headquarters of TUMS, on October 10-11 2018.

Dr. Mohammad Reza Ay, the Head of NBML, said:” regarding the reception of the first symposium held on October 2017, it was concluded that it was possible to introduce research demands of the professors, students, and the researchers through more intense concentration on the common scientific topics in the brain mapping field.

Dr. Hossein Ghadiri, the Administrative and Financial Deputy of NBML and Executive Director of ISBM, mentioned the development and enhancement of national research in cognitive sciences and brain field as the NBML’s main mission. He takes such events as essential by emphasizing on the importance of identifying the human brain. Therefore, the Second Iranian Symposium on Brain Mapping Updates was held on this October.

At the same time as ISBM, the first Brain Mapping Research and Technology Festival was held with the aim of guiding and introducing the knowledge-based companies’ potential in the field of brain mapping. Having access to the free exhibition space they managed, made them a good opportunity to have a closer relationship with researchers and professors of this files and to share their technologies. The eleven companies participated in ISBM were as follows:

• Sina Cognitive Behavioral Sciences Research Institute
• Bita Negar Afraz
• Parto Danesh
• TUMS Preclinical Core Facility
• Cognition clinical Zaban Azmay
• Zist Rah Danesh
• Zist Kankash Toos
• Kimiya Kahroba Mobin
• Kimiyagaran Hakim Noandish
• Medina Teb Gostar
• Brain and Cognition Clinic

This event initiated with the speech of Dr. Mohammad Reza Ay, the Head of NBML, on October 10, 2018. Then the lectures were presented in the order of schedule as follows:

• Dr. Habib Zaidi (9:45 to 10:30): Advances in molecular neuroimaging using PET and PET/MRI
• Dr. Guive Sharifi (11 to 11:45): Awake craniotomy to maximize glioma resection: challenges and outcome
• Dr. Maryam Noroozian (11:45 to 12:30): Prefrontal cortex, the human part of the brain
• Dr. S. K. Setarehdan (14 to 14:45): Stress level assessment by means of the HRV signals extracted from the fNIRS signals
• Dr. Ali Motie Nasrabadi (14:45 to 15:30): Estimation of effective connectivity using coded information in the Artificial neural network model of brain time series
• Dr. Monsoor Fatehi (16 to 15-17): Concepts, Methods, and Challenges of Iranian brain Mapping Biobank
• Dr. Reza Zomorrodi (17 to 17:45): Paired associative stimulation for probing human neuroplasticity and inducing functionally relevant change

At the end of the first day, the first Brain Mapping Student Branch meeting was held for two hours at the conference hall of the headquarters of Tehran University of Medical Sciences including various programs. The news of this meeting is available on the news section of NBML’s website

The order of lectures on the second day was as follows:

• Dr. Hamid Soltanian-Zadeh (9 to 9:45): Estimation and Application of Brain Connectivity in Health and Disease
• Dr. Farzad Towhidkhah (9:45 to 10:30): Transcranial electrical stimulation and neurocognitive functions
• Dr. Reza Rostami (11 to 11:45): The effectiveness of transcranial magnetic stimulation(TMS) on the cognitive symptoms of the patients with depressive disorders: a retrospective study
• Dr. Mohammad Ali Oghabian (11:45 to 12:30): NeuroImaging methods for human brain mapping
• Dr. Saeid Sanei (14 to 14:45): EEG-fMRI for detection of cortical and deep brain sources
• Dr. Shahin Nasr (14:45 to 15:30): Application of high-resolution functional magnetic resonance imaging in understanding the human visual perception
• Dr. Hamed Nili (16:15 to 17): Beyond functional connectivity: representational connectivity
• Dr. Mohammad Reza Nazemzadeh (17 to 17:45): brain neuroplasticity in fMRI and DTI

After completion of the lectures, the closing ceremony was held including various sections as follows: Dr. Ghadiri speech, playing the clip prepared for two days of symposium, awarding and appreciating the winner of fMRI and BCI national competition and announcing the top poster winner of symposium and appreciating Mr. Sobhan Hemati with an article titled: “Different inter-hemispheric mutual information within GLM region of interest during concrete and abstract word mental imagery “.