Advancing knowledge of human development, developmental disabilities, and neurodegenerative diseases.
By identifying MRI biomarkers in animal models of pediatric brain injury, Waisman investigator Peter Ferrazzano hopes to provide a means for selecting the patients most likely to benefit from a particular neuroprotective intervention in subsequent clinical trials.
In typical development, listeners can use semantic content of verbs to facilitate incremental language processing-a skill that is associated with existing language skills. Studies of children with ASD have not identified an association between incremental language processing in semantically-constraining contexts and language skills, perhaps because participants were adolescents and/or children with strong language skills.
EEG is currently the only clinically feasible method to evaluate hearing in infants and children who are unable to participate in behavioral hearing tests. We modified naturally spoken vowels and fricatives to elicit envelope following responses (EFR) at low, mid and high frequencies–the prime spectral regions essential for speech understanding, and speech and language development.
Neurogenesis is thought to be sustained throughout life through the constant regulation of neural stem cell (NSC) quiescence exit, a time in which a NSC enters the cell cycle to generate more neural stem cells and/or other neural cell types. One critical component of NSC quiescence exit is the clearance of aggregated proteins.
Helping youth with disabilities pursue post-high school employment and education opportunities can mean piecing together services from a broad range of agencies and organizations. This can be a challenge for anyone, but for low-income families, day-to-day survival may create additional barriers to accessing services and supports needed to launch youth with disabilities into adult life. …
Recent advances in genome sciences — the study of an organism’s complete set of DNA — present a golden opportunity to identify the genetic causes and underlying mechanisms of intellectual and developmental disabilities. These discoveries will also improve diagnosis and potential treatments for these conditions. To advance science in this innovative field, the Waisman Center …
Rett syndrome (RTT) is a severe neurodevelopmental disease caused by mutations in the methyl-CpG binding protein 2 (MECP2) gene. Although altered interneuron development and function are clearly demonstrated in RTT mice, a particular mode of inhibition, tonic inhibition, has not been carefully examined.
A gift from the Mancheski Foundation continues to provide integral support to doctoral student Matthew Zammit as he furthers his research on the progression of Alzheimer’s disease in individuals with Down syndrome. Zammit is beginning his fourth year as a doctoral student working in the laboratory of Bradley Christian, PhD, a Waisman investigator and professor …
It’s been seven years since Dick Morse, MD, a UW alum and retired child psychiatrist, and his lifelong partner, Lawrence M. Connor, MSW, a retired social worker, established an $11 million (now worth an estimated $17 million) planned estate gift for the Morse Society — a multidisciplinary graduate fellowship program at the Waisman Center.
2019 Year-in-Review
