USC-Davis

Our inau­gur­al Sharp­Brains Sum­mit con­tin­ues to grow momen­tum — here goes a quick update.

New Speak­ers:

Thomas M. War­den is Assis­tant Vice Pres­i­dent and Leader of Allstate’s Research and Plan­ning Cen­ter (ARPC). He helps sets ARPC’s research agen­da and man­age its exe­cu­tion by 60-mem­ber ARPC staff, lead­ing the devel­op­ment of sig­nif­i­cant inno­va­tions that con­tribute to Allstate’s prof­itable growth. He is a Char­tered Finan­cial Ana­lyst and has an M.B.A. from Har­vard University.

Dr. Lau­rence Hir­sh­berg directs the Neu­roDe­vel­op­ment Cen­ter and serves on the fac­ul­ty of the Depart­ment of Psy­chi­a­try and Human Behav­ior of the Brown Uni­ver­si­ty Med­ical School as Clin­i­cal Assis­tant Pro­fes­sor. The Neu­roDe­vel­op­ment Cen­ter is one of the 20 research sites world­wide par­tic­i­pat­ing in the largest study of neu­ro­phys­i­o­log­i­cal mark­ers for depres­sion. Dr. Hir­sh­berg is a licensed clin­i­cal psy­chol­o­gist and cer­ti­fied in EEG biofeed­back by the Biofeed­back Cer­ti­fi­ca­tion Insti­tute of Amer­i­ca, and recent­ly served as Guest Edi­tor and con­trib­u­tor to a spe­cial issue of Child and Ado­les­cent Psy­chi­atric Clin­ics of North Amer­i­ca devot­ed to emerg­ing inter­ven­tions in applied neu­ro­science, includ­ing neu­ro­feed­back and oth­er brain based interventions.

New Sil­ver Sponsor:

A.G.E. Mat­ters is a mul­ti­dis­ci­pli­nary Adult and Geri­atric Eval­u­a­tion Clin­ic in Toron­to, Ontario, Cana­da, with a mis­sion to pro­vide swift and con­tin­u­al­ly upgrad­ed access to com­mu­ni­ty-based, com­pre­hen­sive assess­ment of cog­ni­tion, func­tion and behav­ior; per­son­al­ized pro­grams of pre­ven­tion, coun­sel­ing, edu­ca­tion and treat­ment; and nutri­tion­al and lifestyle rec­om­men­da­tions, cog­ni­tive train­ing pro­grams, and med­ica­tions of proven benefit.

New Part­ners:

The Alzheimer’s Drug Dis­cov­ery Foun­da­tion was estab­lished in 2004 as a pub­lic char­i­ty to sup­port the advance­ment of drugs to pre­vent, treat, and cure Alzheimer’s dis­ease, relat­ed demen­tias, and cog­ni­tive aging. Our strat­e­gy of ven­ture phil­an­thropy is based on the idea that our research grant recip­i­ents are engaged in projects that are poten­tial­ly viable in the mar­ket­place with a pos­si­ble return on investment.

The Inter­na­tion­al Coun­cil on Active Aging® (ICAA) was found­ed in the belief that uni­fy­ing the efforts of the orga­ni­za­tions focused on old­er adults ben­e­fits both the peo­ple they reach and the orga­ni­za­tions them­selves. Today, the vision is shared by over 8,000 orga­ni­za­tions con­nect­ed to the ICAA network.

The Knowl­edge Media Design Insti­tute (KMDI) is a leader in inter­dis­ci­pli­nary research and teach­ing at the Uni­ver­si­ty of Toron­to. Our work spans the sci­en­tif­ic study of the ways in which media and media tech­nolo­gies shape, and are shaped by, human activ­i­ty, and the prac­ti­cal work of found­ing an inter­dis­ci­pli­nary nexus for the design of such media. Adopt­ing a human-cen­tred and par­tic­i­pa­to­ry approach to design, our goal is to enhance human skill rather than dimin­ish it, and to encour­age cre­ativ­i­ty and innovation.

The USC Davis School of Geron­tol­ogy has con­sis­tent­ly pio­neered inno­v­a­tive edu­ca­tion­al pro­grams includ­ing the world’s first Ph.D. in Geron­tol­ogy, the first joint Master’s degree in Geron­tol­ogy and Busi­ness Admin­is­tra­tion, and the first under­grad­u­ate Health Sci­ence Track in Geron­tol­ogy. Research in mol­e­c­u­lar biol­o­gy, neu­ro­science, demog­ra­phy, psy­chol­o­gy, soci­ol­o­gy and pub­lic pol­i­cy is con­duct­ed under the aus­pices of the Ethel Per­cy Andrus Geron­tol­ogy Cen­ter, found­ed in 1964.

Still much much more work ahead…but we are excit­ed to see how this is shap­ing up!

For more infor­ma­tion, and to Reg­is­ter a ear­ly-bird rates, click on Sharp­Brains Sum­mit.