MRC Cognition and Brain Science Unit
Unit profile from the MRC Network publication issued Spring 2004.
Established 60 years ago during World War II, the MRC Cognition and Brain Sciences Unit has grown to become an internationally renowned centre for research that probes one of biology's last unexplored frontiers – the inner workings of the human mind.
Kenneth Craik (left) conducting a visual adaption experiment with Oliver Zangwill as subject in 1938.
In 1944, at the height of World War II, the MRC brought together 11 Cambridge University researchers to form the Unit for Research in Applied Psychology. Headed by the brilliant young psychologist Kenneth Craik, their task was to help the war effort by "suiting the job to the man … the man to the job, and … improving the man's performance". Using simulations and laboratory tests they sought to make it as easy as humanly possible for people to perform vital tasks such as gun and bomb aiming, artillery shell loading, reading maps, radar screens and cockpit instrument panels, and to improve their attention and vigilance in boring, tiring or stressful wartime settings.
Tragically, Craik died aged just 31 in an accident on the eve of VE day when an opening car door threw him from his bicycle into the path of an oncoming lorry. But the research he had instigated into basic human capacities such as memory and attention continued in the post-war years. Prompted by more prosaic concerns in peacetime, the Applied Psychology Unit's later commissions included developing the postcode and designing the 50p piece. More importantly, successive Directors built on Craik's legacy to expand the Unit and consolidate its position as one of the world's largest and longest-standing contributors to the development of psychological theory and practice.
Joined-up thinking
Already famed for its work in experimental and applied psychology, the unit's emphasis shifted during the 1990s to embrace more theoretical approaches and the latest brain science. In 1997 the incoming Director, Professor William Marslen-Wilson, was charged with reorienting and reorganising the Unit's work. It was renamed the Cognition and Brain Sciences Unit (CBU) in 1998 to reflect this transition. The organisational changes coincided with a major refurbishment of the Edwardian mansion at the heart of the old Unit and the construction of a new wing housing state-of-the-art facilities. With nearly 100 scientists, students and research staff, the CBU now hosts one of the largest single concentrations of cognitive scientists and neuroscientists anywhere in the world. The stage is set for a flourishing future as an internationally competitive centre for interdisciplinary research in cognitive neurosciences.
In its new incarnation, the unit's main thrust is towards greater integration of cognitive science with neuroscience to marry theoretical descriptions of mental processes and organisation with ever more detailed analyses of how the brain works. Its ultimate goal is to explain the fundamental components of human cognitive function. Four research groups – Memory, Emotion, Attention, and Speech and Language – each concentrate on a particular facet of this ambitious enterprise. They conduct behavioural experiments in healthy volunteers and patients to find out how these processes work, study where and when they happen within the brain, build computer models to test their theories, and explore the clinical implications for patient therapy and rehabilitation. Their work demands a multi-disciplinary approach, so each group draws together experts in cognitive and behavioural theory, neurology, and increasingly, neuroimaging. A Methods group provides statistical and R&D support, and expertise in mathematical analysis and imaging. Strong links between CBU's research groups reflect their overlapping areas of interest, and there are also numerous collaborations with other Cambridge University-based programmes, notably the Departments of Experimental Psychology and Physiology, Clinical School Departments such as Neurology and Psychiatry, and the Wolfson Brain Imaging Centre at Addenbrooke's hospital.
Picture this
Neuroimaging advances over the past decade have revolutionised psychology, giving scientists their first tantalising glimpse of what is happening inside the living, working brain. This newfound ability has become the lynchpin of the CBU's research activities; several dozen imaging projects, involving more than half its research scientists and students, are in progress and more are planned. The techniques they use – positron emission tomography (PET), functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), electro- and magneto-encephalography (EEG and MEG) – might sound like something from science fiction, but in fact provide complementary views of the brain's activities. PET and fMRI measure physiological changes that accompany activation of particular brain regions, and are well suited to showing where things are happening and how they change over timescales of seconds and longer. EEG and MEG, which detect tiny electrical and magnetic traces of neural activity at the skull surface, provide less precise spatial information, but can capture events occurring on the millisecond timescale of nerve signals. EEG and MEG are so sensitive that CBU researchers can track language-related brain activity from the moment the visual cortex registers a written word, to frontal-lobe activation 100 milliseconds later, and on to subsequent word-processing levels.
In sickness and in health
Much of the Unit's research relies heavily on the support of its long-running volunteer panel who take part in behavioural experiments testing different cognitive abilities to determine how they work, and functional imaging studies to pin down the parts of the brain involved. The Unit also has a strong and highly productive clinical interface, through its Addenbrooke's Hospital-based Rehabilitation research group and close links with the world famous Oliver Zangwill Centre for Neuropsychological Rehabilitation at nearby Ely. Comparative studies of healthy volunteers and patients with problems including depression, anxiety, Alzheimer's disease, and brain damage after head injuries, cancer and stroke, shed light on how the brain normally works and provide important leads for innovations in clinical practice. Over the last four years, the Unit has assembled a unique panel of 1,500 patients with a variety of brain injuries and assessed their suitability for research. Regular scanning of panel members allows their progress to be monitored over time, and comparing scans from patients with damage in different areas allows researchers to map the brain's functional organisation in ever greater detail.
The CBU's Rehabilitation group led by Barbara Wilson has gained an international reputation for pioneering research on the assessment, treatment, capacity, and recovery of patients with traumatic head injuries and brain damage caused by infections, oxygen starvation and stroke. The group is using imaging to establish whether patterns of recovery from head injury or coma relate to the underlying brain damage; looking at ways to teach patients how to cope with reduced mental capacities; and finding technical solutions to compensate for impaired cognition. Their NeuroPage system, which sends reminders to recovering brain-injury victims to help them to cope with everyday memory and planning problems, is now used nationwide.
Into the mind maze
Despite the huge strides the CBU has made towards revealing the mysteries of the mind, there is still a long way to go. As William Marslen-Wilson emphasises, "Our understanding of the brain's functional architecture is in its infancy; knowing that a particular part of the brain is active when performing a task doesn't say why it is active or what it is doing." A key challenge is to develop increasingly sophisticated brain-imaging techniques that combine and improve upon the complementary strengths of fMRI, PET, EEG and MEG to analyse structure and function in much finer detail. But imaging technologies are simply tools that open new avenues for exploration, not an answer in themselves. Their power must be harnessed in experiments carefully crafted to answer telling scientific questions. The integration of improved technologies with neuropsychological and clinical research will be crucial to building on the CBU's core strengths in cognitive theory and experimental practice. Only then will it be possible to begin to navigate the labyrinth of dynamic mental processes that govern our senses, understanding, feelings, and memories.