January 2026 Newsletter

University of Washington

Honors and Awards

CNT faculty member Azadeh Yazdan-Shahmorad is a conference chair for the upcoming Annual International Conference of the IEEE Engineering in Medicine and Biology Society (July 26-30, 2026; Toronto, Canada).

Upcoming Events

Precision Neurotechnology Advances and Neuroethical Implications of their Clinical Implementation, Gordon Research Conference, February 8-13, 2026 (Lucca, Italy) – CNT member Amy Orsborn will be a discussion leader.
Wired Minds, Legal Lines: Governing Neurotechnology, 2026 Jaharis Symposium, March 12, 2026 (Chicago, IL, and online).
Incorporating open connectomics data into teaching neuroscience, July 23-24, 2026 (Allen Institute, Seattle, WA).
Coding with Allen Institute Data: A Python Workshop for Undergraduate Educators 2026, July 27-30, 2026 (Allen Institute, Seattle, WA).
Summer Workshop on the Dynamic Brain 2026, August 23-September 6, 2026 (Friday Harbor, WA).

CNT in the News

The ONWARD Medical ARC-EX® System, developed to help restore function in people with spinal cord injuries, has received FDA clearance for use in homes and clinics. CNT co-director Chet Moritz contributed to the success of this device.

Electrodes being placed on the back of the neck of a research participant.

The CNT joined other neuroscience organizations on December 14, 2025 for Science Sunday at the Southwest Branch of the Seattle Public Library. Children and adults explored hands-on exhibits and demonstrations to learn more about the brain.

UW CNT members Jeffrey Ojemann and Jeffrey Herron discuss their work using an implanted device to help stroke patients recover lost function by stimulating their brains to rewire. This work emerged from the CNT testbed on “Co-adaptation for Engineering Neuroplasticity.”

Photos of Jeff Ojemann (left) and Jeff Herron (right)

CNT co-director Rajesh Rao comments about a new study he co-authored that suggests AI can adapt to cultural values by observing human behavior.

New CNT Publications

D’Amico, J., Gelenitis, K., Inanici, F., Field-Fote, E.C., Tefertiller, C. and Moritz, C. Improved sensation with transcutaneous spinal cord stimulation following chronic spinal cord injury, IEEE Trans. Neural Sys. Rehab. Eng., doi: 10.1109/TNSRE.2025.3628192.
Oliveira, N., Li, J., Khalvati, K., Barragan, R.C., Reinecke, K., Meltzoff, A.N. and Rao, R.P.N. (2025) Culturally-attuned AI: Implicit learning of altruistic cultural values through inverse reinforcement learning. PLoS One 20(12): e0337914.
N’dri, A.W., Gebhardt, W., Teulière, C., Zeldenrust, F., Rao, R.P.N., Triesch, J. and Ororbia, A. Predictive coding with spiking neural networks: A survey. Neural Netw. 2025 Nov 26;196:108371. doi: 10.1016/j.neunet.2025.108371.
Miles, J.T., Weaver, K.E., Webb, S.J. and Ojemann, J.G.. Developmental relationships between the human alpha rhythm and intrinsic neural timescales are dependent on neural hierarchy, J, Neurophysiol, in press.

Job Opportunities

Post-doc/Research Scientist, Translational Neurophysiol. Laboratory, Feinstein Inst. (Manhasset, NY).
Tenured/Tenure-track position in Cognitive Psychology, Dept. Psychological and Brain Sciences, Johns Hopkins Univ. (Baltimore, MD).
Assistant Professor, Dept. Biomedical Eng., Univ. North Carolina (Chapel Hill, NC).
Associate or Full Professor, Dept. of Bioeng. and Arc Institute, Stanford Univ. (Stanford, CA).
Assistant/Associate/Full Professor, Dept. of Neurology, LSU Health Shreveport (Shreveport, LA).
Senior Research Associate, Bioelectronics and Neuroengineering for Pain, Dept. Eng. Sci., Univ. Oxford (Oxford, UK).
Director of the Centre for Neuroscience Studies, Queen’s University (Kingston, ON, Canada).
Faculty Position in Computational Neuroscience, Dept. Neuroscience, Univ. Texas at Dallas (Richardson, TX).
Assistant/Associate/Professor in Neurotechnology, College of Engineering, Univ. Utah (Salt Lake City, UT).