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[EXPIRED] The Capital Region of Copenhagen is looking for a 2-year research assistant in precision brain imaging in Parkinsons's disease

Our team has made major progress in imaging the involvement of the substantia nigra and locus coeruleus in Parkinson´s disease over recent years.

Are you interested to become a part of our team and that continuously pushes the frontiers of precision MRI of the human brain and Parkinson’s disease at 3T and 7T?

Are you eager to work in a dynamic research environment in the Movement Disorders group and to leverage a unique clinical and  MRI infrastructure?

Do you thrive in multi-disciplinary environments where you closely interact with collaborators at the department, but also internationally?
If yes, we would like to see your application.

The Danish Research Centre for Magnetic Resonance (DRCMR) has an open research opportunity for a highly motivated research assistant to conduct cutting-edge research in clinical neuroscience and magnetic resonance imaging.

We are looking for a candidate who will help us acquire and analyze structural and functional MRI data in healthy participants and patients with Parkinson’s disease. You will have the opportunity to collaborate with an interdisciplinary team consisting of M.D.s, psychologists, physiologists, engineers, and basic- and clinical neuroscientists. You will join the Movement Disorders group led by Research Fellow David Meder as well as the ADAPT-PD project group led by Prof. Hartwig Siebner. Here, you will contribute to our efforts to map the changes in functional brain networks in Parkinson’s disease patients. Furthermore, you will aid our continuous work on ultra-high field (7 tesla) imaging of structural changes in midbrain nuclei in different stages of the disease. The employment may lay the foundation for an extension into a PhD position.

About us:

The Danish Research Centre for Magnetic Resonance (DRCMR) is one of the leading research centers for biomedical MRI in Europe (www.drcmr.dk). Our interdisciplinary research is geared to triangulate between MR physics, basic physiology, and clinical research. Approximately 70 researchers from a diverse range of disciplines are currently pursuing basic and clinically applied MR research with a focus on structural, functional, and metabolic MRI of the human brain and its disorders.

Collaboration is key at DRCMR – we do not expect any researcher to be able to do everything alone, but we expect everyone to be interested in sharing knowledge with colleagues.

The DRCMR is embedded in the Department of Radiology and Nuclear Medicine, a large diagnostic imaging department including all biomedical imaging modalities at Copenhagen University Hospital Hvidovre. The hospital also has strong collaborative links with the Technical University of Denmark and is part of the newly established organizational framework, The Technical University Hospital of Greater Copenhagen. DRCMR has close interaction with clinicians and radiologists and a state-of-the-art MR-research infrastructure, which includes a pre-clinical 7T MR scanner, six whole-body MR scanners (one 7T, four 3T and one 1.5T scanners), a hardware workshop and laboratory, a neuropsychology laboratory, an EEG laboratory, and two laboratories for non-invasive brain stimulation.  The 7T is a national research infrastructure, serving internal and external users across Denmark.                                                                                                                                                             

The position:

You will be employed as a research assistant for a two-year period at the Danish Research Centre for Magnetic Resonance with good possibilities of extension.

Your daily tasks will vary according to the flow of the projects, but will mainly be centered around:

  • conducting functional MRI experiments with healthy participants and patients with Parkinson’s disease at 3T
  • conducting structural MRI experiments with healthy participants and patients with Parkinson’s disease at 7T
  • analyzing functional and structural MRI and behavioral data
  • engaging in teaching, knowledge dissemination, and publication of results in international, recognized scientific journals

The ideal candidate

  • You hold a MSc degree in medicine, neuroscience, biomedical engineering or a related field.
  • You have excellent written and interpersonal communication skills.
  • You enjoy being part of a multidisciplinary and international research team where flexibility, coordination skills and helping each other out are key comptencies.

A major advantage would be experience in any of the following:

  • experience with MR data acquisition and analysis
  • experience working with patients with Parkinson's disease or other movement disorders.
  • programming skills (preferably in Matlab or Python)

The project will be supervised by Research Fellow David Meder and Prof. Hartwig Siebner.

 

Selected Publications

Recent publications & Pre-prints 

Naiara Demnitz, Oliver J. Hulme, Hartwig R. Siebner, Michael Kjaer, Klaus P. Ebmeier, Carl-Johan Boraxbekk, Claire M. Gillan (2023). Characterising the covariance pattern between lifestyle factors and structural brain measures: a multivariable replication study of two independent ageing cohorts, Neurobiology of Aging, Volume 131,2023, Pages 115-123, ISSN 0197-4580,IF 3.7.

TH Siebner, JD Hove, CF Madelung, OJ Hulme, F Bendtsen, HR Siebner, Flemming Bendtsen, Mads Barløse (2024). No difference in postprandial mesenteric blood flow between healthy younger and elderly individuals, Scientific Reports 14 (1), 8689.

TS Hjerresen, M Bentz, AB Nejad, E Raffin, KW Andersen, OJ Hulme, Hartwig Roman Siebner, Kerstin Jessica Plessen. Performing well but not appreciating it–A trait feature of anorexia nervosa. JCPP advances 4 (1), e12194.

Oliver Hulme, Arne Vanhoyweghen, Colm Connaughton, Ole Peters, Simon Steinkamp, Alexander Adamou, Dominik Baumann, Vincent Ginis, Bert Verbruggen, James Price, and Benjamin Skjold (2023). Reply to “The Limitations of Growth-Optimal Approaches to Decision Making Under Uncertainty”. Econ Journal Watch, 20(2) p335-348.

Hulme Oliver J., Roulston Barrie, Overgaard Morten (2023). Does report modality modulate psychophysical sensitivity? The jury remains out. Frontiers in Psychology, 14, https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fpsyg.2023.1226588.

Thorup AAE,… Hulme OJ, … Nordentoft M (2022). The Danish High-Risk and Resilience Study-VIA 15 - A Study Protocol for the Third Clinical Assessment of a Cohort of 522 Children Born to Parents Diagnosed With Schizophrenia or Bipolar Disorder and Population-Based Controls. Frontiers in Psychiatry.

Lopez-Yepez JS, Martin J, Hulme OJ, Kvitsiani D. (2021). A normative account of choice history effects in mice and humans. PloS Computational Biology.

Lopez-Yepez JS, Martin J, Hulme OJ, Kvitsiani D. (2021)
A normative account of choice history effects in mice and humans
PLoS Computational Biology

Meder D, Rabe F, Morville T, Madsen KH, Koudahl MT, Dolan RJ, Siebner HR, Hulme OJ. (2021)
Ergodicity-breaking reveals time optimal economic behavior in humans
PLoS Computational Biology

Morville T, Friston KJ, Burdakov D, Siebner HR, Hulme OJ. (Pre-print)
The Homeostatic Logic of Reward
bioRxiv, doi.org/10.1101/242974.

Morville T, Madsen K, Siebner HR, Hulme OJ. (2021)
Reward signaling in brainstem nuclei under glycemic flux
PloS One

Hulme, OJ, Wagenmakers EJ, Damkier P, Madelung CF, Siebner HR, Helweg-Larsen J, Gronau Q, Benfield TL, Madsen KH. (2021) A Bayesian reanalysis of the effects of hydroxychloroquine and azithromycin on viral carriage in patients with COVID-19.
PloS One. doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0245048

Friston KJ, Parr T, Zeidman P, Razi A, Flandin G, Daunizau J, Hulme OJ, Billig AJ., Litvak V, Price CJ., Moran RJ., Costello A, Pillay D, Lambert C. (2020)
Effective immunity and second waves: a dynamic causal modelling study
Wellcome Open Res2020, 5:204 (doi.org/10.12688/wellcomeopenres.16253.2)

van der Vegt JPM, Hulme OJ, Madsen KH, Buhmann C, Bloem BR, Münchau A, Helmich RC, Siebner HR (2020)
Dopamine agonist treatment increases sensitivity to gamble outcomes in the hippocampus in de novo Parkinson’s disease
NeuroImage Clinical

Faranda D, Castillo IP, Hulme OJ, Jezequel A, Lamb J, Sato Y, Thompson E, (2020)                                                                         
Asymptotic estimates of SARS-CoV-2 infection counts and their sensitivity to stochastic perturbation
Chaos. 2020;30(5):051107. doi:10.1063/5.0008834

Friston KJ, Parr T, Zeidman P, Razi A, Flandin G, Daunizau J, Hulme OJ, Billig AJ, Litvak V, Price CJ, Moran RJ., Lambert C. (2020)
Second waves, social distancing, and the spread of COVID-19 across America.
Wellcome Open Res 2020, 5:103 (doi.org/10.12688/wellcomeopenres.15986.1)

Friston KJ, Parr T, Zeidman P, Razi A, Flandin G, Daunizau J, Hulme OJ, Billig AJ, Litvak V, Price CJ, Moran RJ, Lambert C. (2020)
Dynamic causal modelling of COVID-19.
Wellcome Open Res 2020, 5:89

Friston KJ, Parr T, Zeidman P, Razi A, Flandin G, Daunizau J, Hulme OJ, Billig AJ., Litvak V, Price CJ., Moran RJ., Costello A, Pillay D, Lambert C. (2020)
Testing and tracking in the UK: A dynamic causal modelling study
Wellcome Open Research 5 (144), 144  

Hulme OJ, Morville T, Gutkin B. (2019)
Neurocomputational Theories of Homeostatic Control
Physics of Life Reviews, Jul 19. pii: S1571-0645(19)30100-9. doi: 10.1016/j.plrev.2019.07.005  

Hulme OJ, Webb EJ, Sebald A. (2019)
An Introduction to Physiological Economics
Handbook of Research Methods and Applications in Experimental Economics, Edward Elgar Publishing. 

Hulme OJ, Kvitsiani D. (2019)
Extending Models of How Foraging Works: Uncertainty, Controllability, and Survivability
Behavioral and Brain Sciences 2019 Jan;42:e43. doi: 10.1017/S0140525X18002017

Hallsson BG, Siebner HR, Hulme OJ. (2018)
Fairness, fast and slow: A review of dual process models of fairness
Neuroscience and Biobehavioral Reviews. Jun;89:49-60. doi: 10.1016/j.neubiorev.2018.02.016.

Christensen BJ, Schmidt JB, Nielsen MS, Tækkerd L, Holm L, Lunn S, Brediee WLP, Ritz C, Holst JJ, Hansen T, Hilbert A, le Roux CW, Hulme OJ, Siebner HR, Morville T, Naver L, Floyd, AK, Sjödin A. (2018)
Patient profiling for success after weight loss surgery: An interdisciplinary study protocol
Contemporary Clinical Trials Communications. Feb 17;10:121-130. doi: 10.1016/j.conctc.2018.02.002.

Larsen KM, Mørup M,  Birknow MR, Fischer E, Hulme OJ,  Vangkilde A, Schmock H, Baaré WF, Didriksen M, Olsen L, Werge T, Siebner HR, Garrido MI. (2018)
Altered auditory processing and top-down connectivity in 22q11.2 Deletion Syndrome
Schizophrenia Research. Jan 30. pii: S0920-9964(18)30048-3. doi: 10.1016/j.schres.2018.01.026.

Meder D, Kolling N, Verhagen L, Wittmann MK, Scholl J, Madsen KH, Hulme OJ, Behrens TEJ, Rushworth MFS. (2017)
Simultaneous representation of a spectrum of dynamically changing value estimates during decision making
Nature Communications. Dec 5;8(1):1942. doi: 10.1038/s41467-017-02169-w.

Friis-Olivarius M, Hulme OJ, Skov M, Ramsøy TZ, Siebner HR. (2017)
Imaging the Creative Unconscious: Reflexive Neural Responses to Objects in the Visual and Parahippocampal Region Predicts State and Trait Creativity
Scientific Reports. Oct 31;7(1):14420. doi: 10.1038/s41598-017-14729-7.

Group Members

Oliver Hulme

Group Leader

Simon Steinkamp

Maria Elisabeth Catharina van der Weij

External Collaborators

Prof. Derek Byrne


Dr. Ole Peters


Dr. Alex Adamou


Dr. Mark Kirstein


Dr. Yonatan Berman


Prof. Sten Madsbad


Assoc. Prof. Tobias Andersen


Assoc. Prof. Christoffer Clemmensen


Postdoc Claus Brandt


Prof. Duda Kvitsiani


Adam Goldstein