BrainBlog

Wilder Penfield Digital Collection Wilder Penfield Digital Collection McGill University Library and Archives From the homepage: "This digital collection consists of a sample of materials selected from McGill University's Osler Library of the History of Medicine's Wilder Penfield Fonds, P142. The images, letters, and other records found here were chosen by the former director of the MNI and close friend of Penfield, Dr. William Feindel, for their significance in documenting both Penfield's life and the history of the Institute. This digitized selection contains material concerning his early life, family, and medical training, the establishment of the MNI, and elements of Penfield's medical research, as well as important peacetime and wartime research and treatment projects carried out by the MNI up until the 1980s."

There are several relevant academic conferences on the near horizon. American Neurological Association (ANA) Baltimore, MD 16-18 October National Academy of Neuropsychology (NAN) Seattle, WA 19-22 October Society for Neuroscience (SfN) San Diego, CA 16-16 November

Content from a sharable broadcast message from Al Filreis, Penn professor: Al Filreis http://writing.upenn.edu/~afilreis ModPo is a free, open, non-credit course on modern and contemporary U.S. poetry. It has been hosted since 2012 by the Kelly Writers House at the University of Pennsylvania. The new 10-week session opens on September 10. To enroll, simply go here: https://www.coursera.org/learn/modpo For those who register, the site will be open all year, so if you cannot finish going through the week-by-week syllabus in the ten weeks between mid-September and mid-November, you can always go back and finish any time later. ModPo hosts weekly live interactive webcasts, and there are meet-ups organized in cities around the world as well as virtual discussion groups arranged around a wide range of interests and affinities. Each of the ModPo TAs hosts weekly office hours. ModPo is fully described—with an FAQ—here: https://www.coursera.org/learn/modpo This is the fifth year...

"The Brain That Couldn't Remember" by Luke Dittrich The New York Times Sunday Magazine 03 August 2016 Article This article is adapted from “Patient H.M.: A Story of Memory, Madness and Family Secrets” by Luke Dittrich, to be published by Random House on Aug. 9. Here is the Annese et al. 2014 paper discussed in the feature story: Annese et al. (2014)

Alzheimer's Association International Conference (July 22-28, Toronto, Canada) has opened! Here is the homepage: AAIC16

Tomorrow, the 15th of July, is the birthday of Dr. Brenda Milner. Happy birthday! Video interview: Video History of Medicine in Canada

The annual meeting of the AACN opens tomorrow, the 9th of June, in Chicago. AACN Annual Meeting

June is Aphasia Awareness Month. For the past twenty years or so, this month in North America has been dedicated to promoting a greater knowledge base among the general public as well as the non-CNS professional community about what aphasia is and about the different medical conditions that might result in aphasia. If you are a clinician or researcher engaged in aphasia-related work of one type or another, this might be a good month to consider a public community talk, an in-service presentation, or a media piece about aphasia. Here is a media piece I wrote back in 2003 during Aphasia Awareness Month: http://www.tmc.edu/tmcnews/06_01_03/page_24.html .

"Suzanne Corkin, Who Helped Pinpoint Nature of Memory, Dies at 79" The New York Times By Benedict Carey 27 May 2016 Obituary

Earlier this year, Dr. Jean Maria Arrigo was celebrated by the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) as the recipient of its 2015 Scientific Freedom and Responsibility Award. 2015 AAAS Scientific Freedom and Responsibility Award Goes to Social Psychologist Jean Maria Arrigo by Andrea Korte AAAS News 08 February 2016 Read press release here [Photo by Anthony Risser, 15 June 2008, Philadelphia]

New developments in torture psychology and the APA, as reported by James Risen in the New York Times: Critic of Psychologists’ Role in Interrogation Is Asked to Reconsider By James Risen The New York Times 15 April 2016 Article [Photo by Anthony Risser, 15 June 2008, Philadelphia]

The annual meeting of the American Academy of Neurology (AAN) has begun. The meeting is taking place in Vancouver. Tweets from the conference appear to be using two hashtags: #AAN16 and #AANAM

An excellent paper is available this month in the current issue of Lancet Neurology :

The American Academy of Clinical Neuropsychology's Annual Conference (June 2016, Chicago) Registration Material and Program are now available, at: AACN registration

"My Beautiful Broken Brain" is a documentary by filmmaker Lotje Sodderland about her life after experiencing an hemorrhagic stroke. It was a Kickstarter-funded project. It is co-directed by Lotje and Sophie Robinson. Both are joined by David Lynch as Executive Directors of the film. Film website: My Beautiful Broken Brain Available on Netflix in mid-March after its SXSW premiere. (Here is an article by Lotje Sodderland written for The Guardian in late November, 2015: I felt as if I had become fear itself .)

The 44th Annual Meeting of the International Neuropsychological Society (INS) begins today in Boston. The homepage of of the meeting can be found here .

Again and again and again ... "Pentagon Wants Psychologists to End Ban on Interrogation Role" by James Risen The New York Times 24 January 2016 Read article here [Photo by Anthony Risser, 15 June 2008, Philadelphia]

The new novel from Joyce Carol Oates is about a person with amnesia and his relationship with his clinical scientist. Place this work of fiction adjacent to the non-fiction work about Patient H.M and - voila! - the covers seem to create what could be another story! I will be writing and posting a review of the Joyce Carol Oates novel here next week.

UCL (University College London) is presenting a four-week MOOC on the FutureLearn platform (no cost) titled "The Many Faces of Dementia" . The course begins on 14th March. Course Description Four domains are explored: Familial Alzheimer's Disease, bvFTD, Dementia with Lewy Bodies, and Posterior Cortical Atrophy.

Lumosity to Pay $2 Million to Settle FTC Deceptive Advertising Charges for Its “Brain Training” Program Company Claimed Program Would Sharpen Performance in Everyday Life and Protect Against Cognitive Decline For Release January 5, 2016 FTC Press Release Case Timeline here