Emerging Horizons in Neuromodulation: New Frontiers in Brain and Spine Stimulation

Dr. Elena Moro graduated in Medicine at the University of Trieste (Italy) in 1989 and completed her residency in Neurology at the Catholic University in Rome (Italy) in 1996. She received her PhD in Neurosciences from the Catholic University in Rome, after having spent one and a half years in Grenoble, France (Joseph Fourier University), where she worked under the supervision of Dr. P. Pollak and Dr. A.L. Benabid. For her doctoral research Dr. Moro studied the response to levodopa and the electrical parameters of stimulation in parkinsonian patients with subthalamic nucleus deep brain stimulation. From 2000 to 2002 she moved to Milan (Italy) in order to start and develop a surgical team for Movement Disorders at the Niguarda Ca’ Granda Hospital. In 2002, she joined the Division of Neurology at the University of Toronto (Canada) as an Assistant Professor, and medical Director of the surgical program for Movement Disorders at the Toronto Western Hospital. She worked with Dr. A.M. Lozano and Dr. A.E. Lang. She was promoted to Associate Professor of Neurology of the Faculty of Medicine, University of Toronto, in 2009. In 2012 she moved to Grenoble, France, as Professor of Neurology at the Joseph Fourier University (CHU Grenoble). She is currently investigating the effects of DBS on gait in parkinsonian and dystonic patients, the role of the superior colliculus as biomarker in Parkinson’s disease and the effects of the pedunculopontine nucleus stimulation. She is also responsible of the neurology teaching for undergraduate students and residents in neurology at the Faculty of Medicine of the Joseph Fourier University. She has so far published 108 scientific papers cited in PubMed and she has been an invited speaker to more than 100 international scientific meetings. Mircea Polosan is at University Hospital Center of Grenoble, France Dr. Clement Hamani is the Research Director of the Hurvitz Brain Sciences Program, Senior Scientist at the Sunnybrook Research Institute, Full Professor in Surgery/Neurosurgery at the University of Toronto, preclinical lead of the Harquail Centre for Neuromodulation, and neurosurgeon at the Sunnybrook Health Sciences Centre in Toronto, Canada. Dr. Hamani’s research focus is the development of new ways of modulating the function of the nervous tissue, and discovering new applications for techniques that stimulate the brain and spinal cord to treat neurological and psychiatric disorders. His work ranges from basic research in preclinical models to clinical trials.

Preface

1. Non-invasive cortical stimulation: Transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS)

2. Invasive cortical stimulation

3. DTI for brain targeting: Diffusion weighted imaging fiber tractography-assisted deep brain stimulation

4. Deep brain stimulation in Alzheimer's disease

5. Electrical deep neuromodulation in psychiatry

6. Adaptive deep brain stimulation (aDBS)

7. New developments for spinal cord stimulation

8. Restoring upper extremity function with brain-machine interfaces

9. Optogenetically-inspired neuromodulation: Translating basic discoveries into therapeutic strategies

10. Focused ultrasound neuromodulation

11. From vision to action: Canadian leadership in ethics and neurotechnology