Student-Led Neuroscience Research
Brain Wave Research
Brain Wave at UCLA gives undergraduate students the opportunity to participate in neuroscience research through data analysis, scientific writing, poster development, and collaborative publication work.
Featured Publication
Posterior Cortex Isolation Enhances Detection of Alpha Desynchronization During Sustained Attention
St. Clair N, Mahajan S, Leung C, Srinivas C, Oushana L, Zhou F, Dewan N. bioRxiv, November 2025.
This student-led project used EEG signal processing to evaluate whether posterior cortical isolation improves detection of alpha-band changes across time.
Active Research Areas
Members work across computational neuroscience, neuroimaging, electrophysiology, and translational neuroscience questions.
Published Preprint
EEG Alpha Desynchronization
Our EEG research investigates alpha-band power changes across posterior cortical regions using publicly available electrophysiology datasets and reproducible signal-processing pipelines.
Active Project
Alzheimer’s Disease MRI Biomarkers
This project examines structural MRI markers of neurodegeneration, including hippocampal, amygdala, cortical, and ventricular changes across Alzheimer’s disease staging.
Active Project
Oasis Statistical Analysis
Our neuroimaging research examines how diagnostic threshold selection influences structural biomarker interpretation in Alzheimer’s disease datasets. Using OASIS and NACC MRI data, members analyze regional atrophy patterns, phenotype heterogeneity, and statistical differences across hippocampal, cortical, and ventricular brain structures.
How Our Research Process Works
01
Learn
Members begin by reading primary neuroscience literature and learning the biological basis of each project.
02
Analyze
Students use Python, MATLAB, and statistical tools to process neural datasets and generate figures.
03
Present
Teams convert findings into posters, presentations, and conference-style research summaries.
04
Publish
Advanced projects may develop into preprints, manuscripts, or public research reports.
Skills Members Build
Interested in Research?
Brain Wave welcomes students interested in neuroscience, medicine, coding, data analysis, scientific communication, and community-focused research.
Contact Us