INCF Secretariat

Brief biography:

Sean Hill received his B.A. in Computational Neuroscience from Hampshire College in Amherst, MA. After a period spent working in the biotechnology industry, where he supervised a team of programmers working on distributed databases, he then returned to academia to study for a Ph.D. in Computational Neuroscience at the University of Lausanne, Switzerland. Here he investigated the computational role of the auditory thalamocortical circuitry in the rat, research which involved multi-unit recordings and large-scale neuronal simulations.

After receiving his Ph.D. degree, Sean Hill held postdoctoral positions at The Neurosciences Institute in La Jolla, California and the University of Wisconsin, Madison. During this time he developed the first large-scale model of the cat visual thalamocortical system that replicates neural activity during wakefulness and sleep.

In 2006, Sean Hill was recruited by IBM to serve as the Project Manager for Computational Neuroscience in the Blue Brain Project, responsible for co-leading a team of 35 researchers dedicated to constructing a data-driven large-scale model of brain circuitry. In this capacity, he coordinated efforts to integrate gene expression, morphology and electrophysiology data into modeling, simulation, visualization and analysis workflows on a variety of high performance computing platforms. He has also supervised and led research efforts exploring the principles underlying the structure and dynamics of neocortical microcircuitry.

From January 2011 onward, Sean Hill holds the position of INCF Executive Director. 

Job responsibilities:

• Manage the INCF Programs on Digital Brain Atlasing, Ontologies of Neural Structures and Standards for Data Sharing, and the INCF Training Committee
• Manage contracts awarded by INCF in relation to these programs
• Maintain the relevant INCF Program web pages
• Oversee the scientific program for the INCF Congress

Brief biography:
Mathew Abrams joined the INCF Secretariat as a program officer in May 2012. His background includes Neuroimmunology research, Clinical Psychiatry, and Health Systems Management. 

Dr Abrams has a PhD in Neuroscience from Tulane University of New Orleans and an MPH in International Health Systems Management from Tulane University School of Public Health and Tropical Medicine. His first postdoctoral fellowship was at the Center for Gene Therapy at Tulane University where he investigated the therapeutic potential of bone marrow stem cell transplantation in experimental spinal cord injury. His second postdoctoral fellowship was spent at the Department of Neuroscience at Karolinska Institute where he investigated the role of targeting the blood-spinal cord-barrier as a treatment strategy for experimental spinal cord injury.

Dr Abrams has also worked as a health systems management consultant.

In a joint position with KTH placed at the leading Swedish supercomputing center PDC, Dr. Djurfeldt's responsibilities include participating in cutting-edge neuroinformatics research, assisting INCF with services and expertise in tool development, helping optimize INCF's usage of PDC systems and establishing a Nordic hub in INCF's global data network. Dr. Djurfeldt is also the lead developer of the MUSIC library.

Brief Biography:

Mikael Djurfeldt is a neuroinformatics researcher at INCF and PDC/KTH. Dr. Djurfeldt's interests are in computational neuroscience and neuroinformatics. He is interested in the basal ganglia and has worked with Anders Lansner (CB/KTH) on large-scale modeling of the neocortex. Dr. Djurfeldt also has experience in software tool development.

Brief biography:
Prof. Grillner studied at the medical faculty in Gothenburg, Sweden, and received his PhD in neurophysiology in 1969. He has been a Professor and Director of the Nobel Institute for Neurophysiology at the Karolinska Institute since 1987, and is currently the president of the Federation of European Neuroscience Societies (FENS). He is a member of the Academia Europaeae, Royal Swedish Academy of Science, National Academy of Science (US), Institute of Medicine (US) and former chair of the Nobel Assembly and Nobel committee, and has received a number of awards including the Bristol Myers Squibb award in 1993 and the Reeve–Irvine award in 2002. He was the co-recipient of the 2005 SfN Ralph Gerard Prize and The Kavli prize in 2008, which recognizes outstanding contributions to neuroscience.

Full CV: http://www.neuro.ki.se/grillner/cv/stencv.html

Job responsibilities:

• Oversee all of INCF's Programs, strategic alignment between Programs and with INCF's mission and infrastructural developments
• Manage the INCF Programs on Multiscale Modeling and Standards for Data Sharing, and INCF initiatives in the realm of Clinical Neuroinformatics
• Create and manage contracts awarded by INCF in relation to these programs
• Oversee all Program- and infrastructure-related contracts
• Manage cross-Program interaction and developments
• Support the development of new programs through their definition and start-up phase
• Oversee and maintain Program information on the INCF portal and other communications channels
• Maintain links and act as contact point for the Canadian neuroinformatics community

Brief biography:
Linda Lanyon joined the INCF Secretariat as Program Officer in November 2011 and has been Head of Programs since April 2012 and Acting Deputy Director since March 2013. Her background includes theoretical and empirical neuroscience research, computing and informatics.

She obtained a PhD in computational neuroscience from University of Plymouth, UK. Her computational modeling work involves simulating cortical neuronal responses and network dynamics that generate healthy and pathological visual behaviours in humans and monkeys. Her postdoctoral fellowship was spent at The University of British Columbia, Canada, where she extended her research into the empirical realm using MRI neuroimaging, specifically diffusion tensor imaging, to understand the networks involved in human visual perception in health and disease.

During her previous career and BSc(Hons) degree in computing and informatics, Dr Lanyon worked in the UK Government leading software development teams and being involved in two major e-Government initiatives and task forces.

Dr Lanyon held the voluntary position of Director of the Society for Canadian Women in Science and Technology during 2008-2011.

Job responsibilities:

• Coordinate our web design and development projects
• Responsible for information architecture and interaction design to ensure that provided web services meet end-user needs
• Facilitate and support the development, maintenance, and implementation of the INCF graphical profile

Brief biography:
Ylva joined the INCF as a Usability and Requirements Analyst on the development team in April 2007. Ylva has a M.Sc. from the Royal Institute of Technology, specializing in medical engineering. Her professional experience includes project management and development in the life sciences industry, where she has worked with usability and design issues as well as research in product requirements and pre-development feasibility studies.

Job Responsibilities:

• Responsible for defining and implementing an ongoing engagement strategy with the INCF National Nodes and the INCF Secretariat.
• Serve as the primary point of contact between INCF National Nodes and the INCF Secretariat.
• Ensure maintained communication within and across the INCF National Nodes and the broader scientific community.
• Plan and organize biannual INCF Node workshops and other events.
• Develop and implement metrics to monitor and evaluate Node activities and engagement.

Brief Biography:

Malin Sandström joined the INCF in June 2009 as a science communicator, and was also the Program Officer for the INCF Program on Multiscale Modeling between February 2010 and May 2012. From April 2013 she is responsible for communication and engagement between INCF and the scientific community, with a focus on the INCF National Nodes. She has a background in physics and theoretical neuroscience, combined with freelance science writing.  

Malin has a Master's degree in engineering physics  and a PhD in computational neuroscience, both from the Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm.