Ozoswita Deb Roy, a first-year Ph.D scholar working with Dr. Vishnu Sreekumar was selected to attend Neurohackademy 2025, the University of Washington’s renowned summer school on neuroimaging and data science, held from 28 July to 8 August. She was awarded a full travel grant by the organizers, covering flight expenses, registration, and meals, as well as an additional USD 1000 grant from IBRO to cover associated costs, making her participation fully funded.
The program featured intensive seminars and hands-on training sessions led by experts in neuroscience, data science, and open science practices. She attended lectures on reproducibility in cognitive neuroscience (Russ Poldrack), modeling and inference in neuroimaging (John Van Horn), reliability in functional brain networks (Caterina Gratton), deep learning with PyTorch (Noah Benson), diffusion imaging pipelines (Serge Koudoro), scientific communication (Kendrick Kay), analytical flexibility and the Nipoppy proposal (JB Poline), MRI physics (John Pyles), statistical and machine learning methods for fMRI with Nilearn (Elizabeth DuPre), and user-friendly fMRI design tools (Stephanie Noble), among others. The training covered essential computational tools such as scientific computing in Python, collaborative workflows using GitHub, and automated pipelines with GitHub Actions, equipping her with fairly practical skills for large-scale neuroimaging research.
During the project week, she collaborated with fellow participants on a project titled “Encoding-Retrieval Similarity in MTL using the Natural Scenes Dataset (NSD).” This work directly connects with her PhD research on temporal context memory, and the project provided her with new insights into methodological pipelines to analyze large fMRI datasets. Importantly, she was able to interact with the creators of the NSD dataset (Kendrick Kay’s lab) and developers of several widely used neuroimaging packages, building valuable professional connections.
Beyond the academic experience, the summer school emphasized community-building and networking. She participated in multiple social events and also explored the city of Seattle, visiting landmarks such as the Space Needle, Chihuly Glass Garden & Museum, MoPoP, Pike Place Market, Bainbridge Island, and Fremont Sunday Market, with stunning views of Mount Rainier and the Puget Sound. Along the way, she soaked in the city’s art, culture, music, and food, experiences that were further enriched by the friendships she built with fellow participants from around the world.
Participation in Neurohackademy 2025 provided her with valuable technical training, opportunities to interact with leading researchers, and exposure to diverse approaches in neuroimaging and data science. The experience will inform her ongoing Ph.D research and support her professional development in cognitive neuroscience.
Homepage: https://neurohackademy.org/
August 2025