This seminar will provide an overview on how state-of-the-art neuroimaging analysis techniques are being used to better understand the mechanisms underlying psychiatric disorders and on how neuroimaging data can be used to identify targets for brain-based interventions. This seminar will feature presentations from world-leading experts from the Brain & Mental Health Hub and the Melbourne Neuropsychiatry Centre.

Moderated by Trevor Steward, NHRMC/MRFF Fellow, Melbourne School of Psychological Sciences, our speakers for this event are:

• Associate Professor Marta Garrido, Head of Cognitive Neuroscience and Computational Psychiatry Laboratory
• Dr Robin Cash, Senior Research Fellow, Biomedical Engineering, University of Melbourne
• Professor Ben Harrison, Professor of Cognitive and Clinical Neuroscience, Deputy Head of the Department of Psychiatry and Deputy Scientific Director of the Melbourne Neuropsychiatry Centre

Meet the speakers

Associate Professor Marta Garrido leads the Cognitive Neuroscience and Computational Psychiatry Laboratory at the Melbourne School of Psychological Sciences and is Chief Investigator in the Australian Research Council Centre of Excellence for Integrative Brain Function. She established an independent laboratory at the Queensland Brain Institute. In mid-2019 the lab moved to the University of Melbourne. Marta’s team uses a combination of brain imaging techniques and computational modelling to understand the neural underpinnings of learning and decision making both in typical individuals as well as in people with psychiatric disorders.

Dr Robin Cash is an ARC-funded senior research fellow at the University of Melbourne specialising in brain stimulation and neuroimaging. His research focusses on understanding and harnessing the relation between brain network architecture and clinical outcomes to therapeutic brain stimulation. His work and approach is associated with better clinical outcomes and is starting to see clinical uptake across sites in North America, Europe and Asia.He is working to establish an integrated brain stimulation – neuroimaging platform at the University of Melbourne to facilitate clinical translation. His talk will describe the use of brain stimulation for major depressive disorder and the contributions of neuroimaging to advancing therapeutic outcomes.

Professor Ben Harrison is Professor of Cognitive and Clinical Neuroscience and holds dual appointments in the Department of Psychiatry (Deputy Head) and Melbourne Neuropsychiatry Centre (Deputy Scientific Director). Over the past decade, Ben has established the 'Depression and Anxiety Neuroscience' program at UoM: a research program devoted to the neuroscience of affective processes and their role in mood and anxiety disorders – the most common form of mental illness. His team conducts experimental functional neuroimaging research in healthy and clinical populations and has a specific interest in the capacity for neuroimaging to inform treatment outcome prediction. Ben has published over 180 research articles on these and related topics and has received consistent funding support from the NHMRC.

Trevor Steward is a NHRMC/MRFF Fellow at the University of Melbourne School of Psychological Sciences. His research focuses on using ultra high-field 7T MRI technology to understand how subcortical regions of the brain contribute to core symptoms found across psychiatric disorders. Although much of his research to date has examined the neuropsychopathology of eating disorders, he also conducted studies on gambling disorder, PTSD, and obesity. His aim is to leverage neuroimaging tools to improve models of psychiatric disorders and to predict individual clinical outcomes.