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Congratulations to Shivalika Chavan for receiving the UWIN’s Undergraduate Fellowship in Neuroengineering!

UWIN’s Washington Research Foundation Innovation Undergraduate Fellowships in Neuroengineering provide support for undergraduate students whose research relates to both neuroscience and quantitative approaches in math, computer science, or engineering. In her UWIN project, Shivalika proposes to analyze the functional changes that occur as a result of stroke in the sensorimotor cortex of non-human primates (NHPs) and correlate the results with anatomical analyses previously done in the lab. This project supports the lab’s efforts to understand neural networks, their roles in plasticity, and how these networks naturally respond to injury. As past research in the lab suggests, there is great potential to use neural stimulation and coherence as a metric to modulate plasticity and develop a therapy for stroke. Knowledge of both the anatomical and physiological effects of ischemia on the cortex of an NHP is essential to taking the next step: using stimulation (optogenetic and electrical) to rewire the neural circuit around the injury towards functional recovery, making this project a necessity.