Have you ever watched a baby stare at their mom or dad as they talk or make silly faces? Or notice how an infant’s eyes follow their brother or sister’s movements, and wonder, just what is going on inside their brain right now? Scientists studying human development are working to improve equipment to better answer that question.
Some of the best technologies that measure brain activity can be challenging to use on infants, explains Brittany Howell, Virginia Tech associate professor of human development.
“Because nobody had any way of getting the sensors to stay on a baby’s head, cause nobody had really thought about it,” Howell explained. “So that was the first step was to actually get hardware that they would tolerate.”
Howell is working with Read Montague, who leads the Human Magnetometry Laboratory at Virginia Tech. They designed a specialized helmet for babies, that uses a type of brain imagining, called optically-pumped magnetometers-magnetoencephalography ( OPM MEG.
Howell said their team is the only one in the world she’s aware of that’s figured out how to use this technology for an infant under one, sitting up.
“We could have a child and a peer interacting, and we can see what their brains are doing as they interact,” Howell said. “And that’s, that naturalistic and kind of social dimension is really difficult to capture authentically. And I think this technology is going to allow us to do that in ways that weren’t possible before. And that is really, really exciting.”
The researchers will be following 80 kids over four years and studying their brain development, beginning when they are infants.
By studying children through their development, Howell said they can better understand early signs that a child may be diagnosed with a mood or anxiety disorder, or autism later in life. They may also be able to find if there are ways we could reduce risks during an infant’s first months, by providing better nutrition, less exposure to pollution, or allowing more social interactions.
“We’re going to be able to answer questions that have been around surrounding brain development for literally decades,” Howell said.
In the future, Howell said this technology could help researchers learn whether environmental factors, like nutrition or exposure to pollution, may affect brain development.
