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Engaging Grammar and Visual Networks

Project description

New methods to read the brain

Right now, your brain is doing something unique only to humans – reading. Advances in psychology and neuroscience over the last 20 years have provided new insight into how literacy works. There is still much to learn about the neural architecture supporting reading. The EU-funded ENGRAVINg project will use quantitative magnetic resonance imaging (qMRI) and modern magnetoencephalographic methods (MEG) to investigate the connection between visual and language systems. The aim is to explain how changes in myelination of the reading brain tracts relate to the functional interactions between language and visual areas. The findings will contribute to the development of effective literacy interventions for children with learning disabilities.

Objective

Literacy is a fundamental human right and the foundation for lifelong learning. Acquiring a new writing system has huge consequences for our everyday life but also for our brain. However, the neural underpinnings of this unique human skill are still unclear. Understanding how the brain learns to quickly map visual configurations to sounds and concepts represents a scientific challenge with educational and clinical implications. Visual and language brain circuits are strongly influenced by the experience of literacy1. With reading acquisition, these two brain circuits have to adjust and start to interact in completely new ways. The present project will investigate the structural and functional connections between visual and language systems by combining for the first time new cutting-edge techniques of cognitive neuroscience. Modern magnetoencephalographic (MEG) methods allow us to collect fine-grained time course description about cortical activations of visual and language areas, as well as about their spatial localizations and functional connectivity. Moreover, recent advances in quantitative magnetic resonance imaging (qMRI) methods enable us to collect structural measures of the white matter tissue connecting the reading network and measure properties that affect signal conduction, such as myelination. The present proposal will combine these two methodologies in order to describe how changes in myelination of the reading brain tracts are related to the functional interactions between language and visual areas. This new knowledge will allow us to 1) tease apart interactive and modular predictions on the reading network 2) uncover how this structural-functional relation between brain areas changes in reading acquisition and reading impairment.

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Topic(s)

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Funding Scheme

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MSCA-IF - Marie Skłodowska-Curie Individual Fellowships (IF)

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Call for proposal

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(opens in new window) H2020-MSCA-IF-2018

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Coordinator

BCBL BASQUE CENTER ON COGNITION BRAIN AND LANGUAGE
Net EU contribution

Net EU financial contribution. The sum of money that the participant receives, deducted by the EU contribution to its linked third party. It considers the distribution of the EU financial contribution between direct beneficiaries of the project and other types of participants, like third-party participants.

€ 245 732,16
Address
PASEO MIKELETEGI 69 2
20009 San Sebastian
Spain

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Region
Noreste País Vasco Gipuzkoa
Activity type
Research Organisations
Links
Total cost

The total costs incurred by this organisation to participate in the project, including direct and indirect costs. This amount is a subset of the overall project budget.

€ 245 732,16

Partners (2)

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