@mcgovernmit

Our mission is to understand the brain and to apply that knowledge to improve human health and well-being.

 Cambridge, MA
mcgovern.mit.edu
Joined October 2009
  • Tweets2.4K
  • Following1.1K
  • Followers9.4K
637Media
Congrats to Mehrdad Jazayeri for winning the 2026 Robert A. Wurtz Award in Systems Neuroscience from the @NIH and @NatEyeInstitute! 👀 mcgovern.mit.edu/2026/10/05/… @mitbrainandcog @hhmi_science
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Despite how effortlessly humans move in everyday situations, scientists don't yet fully understand the mathematical principles that govern how our brains and muscles work together to create efficient + adaptive movement. We're trying to solve this mystery.
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In Nidhi Seethapathi's lab, researchers are analyzing human movement data from activities like walking, reaching, and grasping using advanced tracking technology. Below: @jillrcrittenden wears movement-tracking sensors that generate her digital avatar (right) in a recent study.
A woman in workout clothes wears movement-tracking sensors on a headband and in various places on her upper and lower body.

ALT A woman in workout clothes wears movement-tracking sensors on a headband and in various places on her upper and lower body.

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Congrats to @Shiwei_MW who defended his doctoral thesis on a new imaging technique that makes nanoscale structures on cell surfaces visible. Developed with @eboyden3, the tech could reveal new targets for treating conditions like Alzheimer's. @mitbrainandcog @broadinstitute
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A new tool developed by MIT researchers can identify suicide warning signs in text conversations with crisis counselors. With further validation, it could help experts better understand who may need urgent support. mcgovern.mit.edu/2026/09/23/…
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The language processing tool, developed by @danielmlow @childmindinst and @satra_, and evaluated with Crisis Text Line, is described in today's @APA Journal of Psychopathology and Clinical Science. doi.org/10.1037/abn0001152
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Patricia and James Poitras '63 are fueling the future of mental health research: their $10M gift establishes 50 two-year fellowships for early-career scientists studying major mental illness at the McGovern Institute. Meet the inaugural cohort: mcgovern.mit.edu/2026/09/22/…
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ALT A composite of five vertical portraits.

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The McGovern Institute is seeking an exceptional faculty member to pioneer the future of translational neuroscience. Learn more and apply online: academicjobsonline.org/ajo/j… @mitbrainandcog
The McGovern Institute is hiring! Faculty position: assistant professor. APPLY NOW. We invite applicants with a backtround in basic science, including but not limited to cell/molecular and/or systems neuroscience, with a strong focus on translational neuroscience.

ALT The McGovern Institute is hiring! Faculty position: assistant professor. APPLY NOW. We invite applicants with a backtround in basic science, including but not limited to cell/molecular and/or systems neuroscience, with a strong focus on translational neuroscience.

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Register now for our fall symposium! Decoding Addiction: Breaking New Ground in Research and Clinical Care Date: Friday, October 23, 2026 Location: Singleton Auditorium (46-3002) Time: 1:00pm - 5:15pm, reception to follow calendar.mit.edu/event/2026-…
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👂Let's HEAR it for @bj_mdn who just successfully defended his doctoral dissertation, "Characterizing and Modeling Auditory Recognition Memory for Natural Sounds." We are so proud of you, Dr. Medina! @mitbrainandcog @ScienceMIT @MIT_SHASS @wmbr
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We were delighted to host the Minister and Chief Innovation Officer of #SierraLeone and his daughters last week. We love it when MIT alums return to campus with their children - especially if those children are interested in learning about the brain! 🥰🧠
David Moinina Sengeh
@dsengeh
Aug 24
I took the girls to the McGovern Institute for Brain Research at MIT where 15 yrs ago we pioneered a method of using MRI and finite element analysis to invent prosthetic socket design. They met with my professor and learned about Purkinje neurons from the best in the field.
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Looking to curl up with a new book this fall? Check out Tomaso Poggio's book, "Brains Minds Machines: The Mystery of Human Intelligence and the Enigmas of the Artificial." @ScienceMIT @mitbrainandcog
The Transmitter@_TheTransmitter
Aug 25
The Transmitter’s summer reading list highlights upcoming neuroscience books and other notable titles from this year—with books by Romain Brette, Susana Carmona, @markdhumphries, @SussilloDavid and more. By @FrankieRivera25 thetransmitter.org/reviews/f…

The Transmitter’s reading list for 2026

Our summer reading list includes books on the Human Brain Project, the neuroscience of motherhood and the career of a Huntington’s disease researcher.

thetransmitter.org
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While some cognitive abilities fade with age, language skills tend to remain sharp. A new MIT-BU imaging study reveals that the brain's language network remains nearly identical in younger and older adults. mcgovern.mit.edu/2026/08/24/… @ScienceMIT @mitbrainandcog

Language skills stay strong in older adults, even while other cognitive abilities decline - MIT...

As people age, many cognitive functions tend to decline. Brain scanning studies have revealed corresponding changes in the function of a brain network that is involved in many of these cognitive...

mcgovern.mit.edu
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The @NatureComms paper is out today: nature.com/articles/s41467-0… Lead authors: Niharika Jhingan @Annel3illoT Senior authors: @ev_fedorenko Swathi Kiran @AphasiaLab

Preserved topography, lateralization, selectivity, and functional connectivity of the language...

Nature Communications - Here, the authors show that aging affects brain networks differently, with neural changes mirroring the preservation or decline of the cognitive functions they support. The...

nature.com
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Shannon Knight @nervousneurons is a @mitbrainandcog PhD student working on a gene therapy for a rare form of childhood-onset epilepsy. She's also a beloved teacher/mentor to many at MIT. 🤩 Read more about Shannon in this MIT profile: news.mit.edu/2026/tackling-r… 📸: Gretchen Ertl
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ALT Smiling woman wearing black clothing and purple latex gloves seated in a lab setting.

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Engineers in Ed Boyden's lab have developed a microscope that captures electrical activity across an entire zebrafish brain at millisecond speed—revealing how neurons coordinate as an emergent whole. mcgovern.mit.edu/2026/08/14/…
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The study published today in @naturemethods 👉nature.com/articles/s41592-0…

Voltage imaging of neurons distributed across entire brains of larval zebrafish

Nature Methods - Voltage imaging across much of the zebrafish brain is achieved at 200.8 Hz, by optimizing a remote-scanning light-sheet microscope.

nature.com
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Great to see this language paper by @ev_fedorenko and her former postdoc @coryshain!
Cory Shain@coryshain
Aug 13
Now out in @NatureComms w/ @ev_fedorenko: across many people (>1k) and tasks (>300), the the brain's language network reliably shows up in the functional connectome (correlated activity in fMRI). 1/
Screen capture of abstract of published article. Title: A language network in the individualized functional connectomes of 1199 human brains doing arbitrary tasks Abstract: A century and a half of neuroscience has yielded many divergent theories of the neurobiology of language. Two factors that likely contribute to this situation include (a) conceptual disagreement about language and its component processes, and (b) intrinsic inter-individual variability in the topography of language areas. Recent functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) studies of small numbers of intensively scanned individuals have argued that a language-selective brain network emerges bottom-up from correlations (individualized functional connectomics, iFC) in task-free (e.g., rest) or task-regressed activation timecourses. Here we tested this hypothesis at scale and evaluated its practical utility for task-agnostic language localization: we apply iFC separately to each of 1,957 (fMRI) scanning sessions (1...

ALT Screen capture of abstract of published article. Title: A language network in the individualized functional connectomes of 1199 human brains doing arbitrary tasks Abstract: A century and a half of neuroscience has yielded many divergent theories of the neurobiology of language. Two factors that likely contribute to this situation include (a) conceptual disagreement about language and its component processes, and (b) intrinsic inter-individual variability in the topography of language areas. Recent functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) studies of small numbers of intensively scanned individuals have argued that a language-selective brain network emerges bottom-up from correlations (individualized functional connectomics, iFC) in task-free (e.g., rest) or task-regressed activation timecourses. Here we tested this hypothesis at scale and evaluated its practical utility for task-agnostic language localization: we apply iFC separately to each of 1,957 (fMRI) scanning sessions (1...

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McGovern Institute retweeted
MIT Science@ScienceMIT
Aug 13
Congratulations to Nergis Mavalvala PhD '97, Dean of the MIT School of Science and Curtis and Kathleen Marble Professor of Astrophysics, on being named to the 2026 @Forbes 50 Over 50! #ForbesOver50 forbes.com/sites/maggiemcgra…
Portrait of Nergis Mavalvala with a frame reading "Forbes 50 over 50 [know your value]"

ALT Portrait of Nergis Mavalvala with a frame reading "Forbes 50 over 50 [know your value]"

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