iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Jessica Bernard @bernardlcmnlab.bsky.social · 02/03/2025

Still wasn't working this morning, but as of 12:30 my local time today (3/2) PubMed is back up and working. Phew! Let's hope it stays that way.

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Jessica Bernard @bernardlcmnlab.bsky.social · 02/03/2025

Right? Pubmed is a key avenue for transparency and lets taxpayers see where their funds go. It's infuriating. I keep checking to see if it's back up. I found out trying to pull a paper recommended by a collaborator for a grant we're working on...hence the commons check.

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Jessica Bernard @bernardlcmnlab.bsky.social · 01/03/2025

So pubmed and eRA Commons seem to be down. The repository that brings federally funded science to the public is seemingly inaccessible. The site for tracking grants is down. And based on a quick search, the whole NIH website.

Webpage with nih.gov in the search bar. Image saying "This site can't be reached"

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Jessica Bernard @bernardlcmnlab.bsky.social · 28/02/2025

Sounds like we should probably take a look! 😉

Emily G. Jacobs @emilyjacobs.bsky.social · 25/02/2025

Reposted by Jessica Bernard

Most of what we know about health and disease centers on the male body. This 2016 NIH policy was a huge win for those of us that want the scientific body of knowledge to serve, well, all bodies.

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Jessica Bernard @bernardlcmnlab.bsky.social · 19/02/2025

Huge congrats to Tracey, and keep an eye as she has more great work to come on this topic in the context of her dissertation. Check it out and let us know what you think! More soon from other amazing lab members... 😀

Jessica Bernard @bernardlcmnlab.bsky.social · 19/02/2025

We suggest that this circuit stands to be critically important for our understanding of cognition and learning in aging and age-related neurodegenerative disease. The hormone effects further highlight the importance of investigating these factors, particularly in females where AD is more common.

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Jessica Bernard @bernardlcmnlab.bsky.social · 19/02/2025

We also explored sex steroid hormone levels, as both the cerebellum and hippocampus are rich with receptors for #estradiol and #progesterone. Older females show marked drops in these hormone with #menopause. More 17beta-estradiol=stronger connectivity. The opposite with progesterone.

Top (A): Connectome ring with primarily red lines, indicating higher connectivity between the cerebellum and hippocampus with higher levels of 17beta-estradiol. Bottom (B): 3D subcortical anatomical rendering showing these effects.

Top (A): Connectome ring with light green lines connecting cerebellar and hippocampal regions, indicating lower connectivity with higher levels of progesterone. Bottom (B): A 3D subcortical rendering of these findings.

Jessica Bernard @bernardlcmnlab.bsky.social · 19/02/2025

Here, we report the first detailed mapping of resting state connectivity between the #cerebellum and #hippocampus in adults 35-86 years of age. Not super surprisingly, connectivity is significantly lower in older partcipants.

Seed regions, spheres, in rainbow colors in the hippocampus and cerebellum. The hippocampal seeds are shown on top, the left image showing the long axis, the right gives us a posterior view. on the bottom we have a saggital view of the cerebellum on the left, and a posterior view on the right.

Top (A): a connectome ring with a lot of blue lines that indicate lower connectivity between the cerebellum and hippocampus as we get older. Bottom (B): a view of these connections shown on 3D subcortical anatomy.

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Jessica Bernard @bernardlcmnlab.bsky.social · 19/02/2025

Up now, a hot off the presses preprint from doctoral student Tracey Hicks, with an assist from post-doc extraordinaire Thamires Magalhaes. We have been exploring cerebello-hippocampal connectivity for the past year, the #hippobellum if you will. www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

biorxiv.org

The Human Cerebello-Hippocampal Circuit Across Adulthood

Direct communication between the hippocampus and cerebellum has been shown via coactivation and synchronized neuronal oscillations in animal models. Further, this novel cerebello-hippocampal circuit m...

Jessica Bernard @bernardlcmnlab.bsky.social · 19/02/2025

Timeline cleanse: while everything else has been scary and uncertain particularly with respect to research and research funding, the awesome team in my lab has been working hard on projects. I have a backlog to share as I held off in *these times*. But their work deserves to be celebrated & shared.

Darby Saxbe @darbysaxbe.bsky.social · 04/02/2025

Reposted by Jessica Bernard

🚨BREAKING. From a program officer at the National Science Foundation, a list of keywords that can cause a grant to be pulled. I will be sharing screenshots of these keywords along with a decision tree. Please share widely. This is a crisis for academic freedom & science.

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Reposted by Jessica Bernard

M. Natasha Rajah @mnrajah.bsky.social · 04/02/2025

Feeling like a bit of a rebel in these times Editing a new SI for Neurobiology of Aging - “Brain Resilience & DIVERSITY in Aging & Dementia” Please consider submitting your work & share broadly. This work is essential for supporting healthy aging for ALL. www.sciencedirect.com/special-issu...

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Jessica Bernard @bernardlcmnlab.bsky.social · 31/01/2025

This is devastating. Women are 50% of the population. Women's health work is necessary.

Jessica Bernard @bernardlcmnlab.bsky.social · 15/01/2025

Looks wonderful — cannot wait to give this a close read and have a journal club at lab meeting. Congrats!!

Jessica Bernard @bernardlcmnlab.bsky.social · 07/01/2025

I'm handling several papers where I've sent over 30 (!!) invitations to potential reviewers. I feel terribly for the authors. Is there a magic trick I'm missing to get reviewers?

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Reposted by Jessica Bernard

Anna J Finley, PhD @annajfinley.bsky.social · 06/01/2025

Reminder that I am looking for a graduate student to start in Fall 2025! Deadline is Jan 15. Check out my lab website for more info about my research www.ndsu.edu/labs/spanh/ and learn about the PhD program here www.ndsu.edu/psychology/g... Margot can’t wait to help review your application!

Brown dog with a black snout with a tiny white blaze showing off a tiny mlem

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Jessica Bernard @bernardlcmnlab.bsky.social · 21/12/2024

Lots of analyses in the paper, so we'd love it if you'd give it a read, ideally with the cookie of your choice. ;) And lots more to come from Tracey and the team next year as our longitudinal analyses on this sample make their way out into the world. #cerebellum #aging #neuroscience #neuroimaging

Jessica Bernard @bernardlcmnlab.bsky.social · 21/12/2024

Not surprisingly, we see associations with age -- as we get older, lobular volume is smaller. There are also robust associations with motor behavior in particular and anterior regions of the cerebellum. This extends prior work showing this in older adults, demonstrating this across adulthood.

Scatterplot showing relationship between pegboard assembly (a fine motor task (horizontal axis) and volume of cerebellar Lobule V (vertical axis). This is a positive relationship so higher volume is associated with better performance, more assembled items. There is a color bar on the right ranging from purple to yellow, such that purple demonstrates older age, and yelllow younger age. An r value is also presented in a text box reading r=0.218.

Jessica Bernard @bernardlcmnlab.bsky.social · 21/12/2024

The amazing Tracey Hicks has a new lead author publication investigating cerebellar lobular volume and network connectivity with respect to age (sample from 35-86 years old), motor, and cognitive behavior. Check it out here: link.springer.com/epdf/10.1007...

link.springer.com

Functional and structural cerebellar-behavior relationships in aging

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Jessica Bernard @bernardlcmnlab.bsky.social · 21/12/2024

Old fashioned shortbread cookies (via NYT Cooking) and an old fashioned. Plus -- a new lab paper to share.

Two shortbread cookies studded with cherries and orange peel on a blue edged plate sitting on the counter. A glass has ice, bourbon, and an orange peel. There's a christmas tree with white lights is in the background, along with a chair and side table.

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Jessica Bernard @bernardlcmnlab.bsky.social · 17/12/2024

A hold over from this weekend: chocolate peppermint buche de Noel.

A log shaped cake covered in chocolate ganache sitting on a glass cake plate. It is sprinkled with powdered sugar and there are sugared cranberries and rosemary for garnish.

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Jessica Bernard @bernardlcmnlab.bsky.social · 15/12/2024

This is pretty much a baking account for the next two weeks.

A tray of round rainbow sprinkle cookies on white parchment paper.

Balls of cookie dough on a tray of sprinkles ready to be rolled

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Reposted by Jessica Bernard

M. Natasha Rajah @mnrajah.bsky.social · 14/12/2024

Disaggregating analyses by Sex & Gender may help too. We have found there are sex differences in the latent brain networks underlying episodic memory - even when there are no group differences in performance. #SGBA+

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Reposted by Jessica Bernard

M. Natasha Rajah @mnrajah.bsky.social · 10/12/2024

“Women’s expressions of passion can also be perceived as overly emotional or even inappropriate, further diminishing their likelihood of being selected for high-potential programs.” Sigh. #AcademicChatter

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Jessica Bernard @bernardlcmnlab.bsky.social · 10/12/2024

Agree with all of the above. And depending on your specific field of study, some of the K mechanisms might also be a good fit if some additional training could be useful in a new area (particularly in service of a future R01).

M. Natasha Rajah @mnrajah.bsky.social · 07/12/2024

Reposted by Jessica Bernard

It is unfortunate how little we know about women’s brain and cognitive aging and the effects of menopause. Help us understand: 🧠 why some 🚺 experience memory difficulties during menopause 🧠 why 2/3 of Alzheimer’s cases are diagnosed in 🚺 Participate in the BHAMM study! Please share this post.

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Jessica Bernard @bernardlcmnlab.bsky.social · 05/12/2024

I should probably embroider this on a pillow or get it tattooed because this AI bot was not wrong. blueskyroast.com/roast/bernar...

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Jessica Bernard @bernardlcmnlab.bsky.social · 02/12/2024

So, while I feel like an absolute jerky stinker about this, something had to give. And when service is 10% of my job but taking up far, far more than that in terms of time, the newest commitment got the axe. Future me/ppl that aren't me: say "No" more often.

Jessica Bernard @bernardlcmnlab.bsky.social · 02/12/2024

Pulled out of a committee I had agreed to co-chair. On the one hand, I feel absolutely awful doing so. But on the other, I hardly have time to focus on research (my first love) and I have grants apps that need attention, especially in this *ever uncertain* funding environment.

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Jessica Bernard @bernardlcmnlab.bsky.social · 26/11/2024

Using moderation analysis, MOCA score is a significant moderator of the connectivity-balance association. With moderated moderation (because one moderator wasn't enough) to look at age, they found age is not significant. All to say, cognition matters here -- maybe more so even than age!

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Jessica Bernard @bernardlcmnlab.bsky.social · 26/11/2024

Broadly, cerebellar connectivity was associated with balance performance, and pretty robustly across seeds. But, so was S1-M1 connectivity. They further divided our sample based on performance on the MOCA and connectivity-balance associations differed based on high or low MOCA score

Jessica Bernard @bernardlcmnlab.bsky.social · 26/11/2024

They were focused on understanding how underlying connectivity and cognition relate to balance performance (measured as 95% ellipse area COP, during eyes opened, open base) in adults ages 35-86. Ashwini honed in on cerebellar M1 and S1-M1 connectivity.

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Jessica Bernard @bernardlcmnlab.bsky.social · 26/11/2024

Heading into the Thanksgiving holiday later this week, and very excited that post-doc Ashwini Sansare had her first lab paper accepted to Neurobiology of Aging. And with a major assist from my other postdoc Thamires Magalhaes (an actual dream team!).

Block diagram representing moderated moderation analysis. Block X reprsents S1-M1 connectivity with an arrow to block Y, balance. Cognition (block W) is above the X-Y arrow. There is one final block (labelled Z) representing age. It is connected by an arrow to the arrow between block W and the X-Y arrow. This represents the moderated moderation

Two scatterplots. Left: the relationships between S1-M1 connectivity on the x-axis and balance on the y-axis. Right: Lobule VIIIa-M1 connectivity is on the x-axis. Each graph has green dots representing those with higher MOCA scores and red dots for those with lower MOCA scores, and trend lines for each. There is also a heavy black general fit line on each. Both graphs show positive correlations. In the graph on the left there is a clear distinction in the relationships for high and low cognition. The relationship for low cognition is a steeper more positive line.

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Jessica Bernard @bernardlcmnlab.bsky.social · 19/11/2024

Almost 20 participants into this new study and very excited to see our eventual results.

An adult male wearing a pink swim cap leans forward on a pillow while receiving cerebellar TMS.

An adult male in blue scrubs and a pink swim cap receives MRI guided TMS to the motor cortex. A female stands in the background looking at the MRI images

Jessica Bernard @bernardlcmnlab.bsky.social · 13/11/2024

I’ve also been in this loop. I really, really miss sitting down with new data and running analyses at the moment.