Brain health should be important to all of us.

One in five Australians will experience mental illness this year, and nearly one in two Australians will experience some form of mental illness at some stage during their life. It is the largest cause of non-fatal disability of any disease in the country. (Australian National Mental Health Report, 2010)

This sounds like all bad news but insights from brain science are giving us a new understanding of our mental wellbeing, and the cause and treatment of disorders of mental health.

We at the Brain Dynamics Centre are committed to pioneering brain research that will ultimately bring about the early identification, the best treatment and the prevention of mental illness while fostering mental health both locally and globally.

How do we operate?

The Brain Dynamics Centre is a collaborative network of centres and units:
Cognitive Neuroscience, Traumatic Stress, Psychosis, Depression, and Modelling.

We are a centre of the Westmead Millennium Institute and the University of Sydney Medical School, at Westmead.

Our academics and researchers are also members of the discipline of psychiatry in the Sydney Medical School and the School of Physics.

Our research is made possible by collaborating nationally and internationally, with clinicians and researchers from

- Westmead Hospital

- Children's Hospital at Westmead 

- General Practice,  University of Sydney Medical School 

- Neuroscience Research Australian (NeuRA) 

- Psychology, University of NSW 

- Cognitive Neuroscience Unit, Flinders University Adelaide 

- Stanford University, Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences 

- Columbia University, Cognitive Neuroscience Division

- University of Pittsburgh, Epidemiology

- Miami University, Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences

- Duke-National University of Singapore,  Clinical Sciences

Brain Dynamics Centre also convenes an international network, BRAINnet. BRAINnet is a scientific network that  provides free access to a database of an unprecedented array of brain, cognitive, genomic and clinical data for research and scientific publication.

Why are we unique?: An Integrative Neuroscience approach

We follow a unique 'integrative neuroscience' approach that brings together theories across disciplines, multiple measures and scales of function.

Our goals are to understand individual brain dynamics, profiles of mental health disorder, and how treatments can be tailored to suit the individual person.

Our research is part of the international BRAINnet network. We make use of the standardized Brain Resource assessments so we can pool information across sites (see Brain Resource Discovery).

BDC research programs are based on integration across:

Theory:
Common themes across disciplines, including psychiatry, psychology, neuroscience and physiology.

Research Techniques:
Clinical assessments, psychological and cognitive assessments, brain imaging (EEG, ERP and MRI, fMRI), and genetics (see Facilities).

Modeling and Analysis:
BDC researchers have established a biophysical model of the brain based on real physiological parameters. We also focus on new statistical methods, such as connectivity and synchrony analyses.

Clinical translation: 
Our goal is to identify brain-gene markers that will help identify risk for mental health disorders, and how to tailor treatments and therapies to best suit each individual person.

High-capacity computing:
We continually develop our severs and network area storage systems to support the integrative approach and multiple modes of testing (see Facilities).