Whether she’s helping the Health, Brain & Cognition Lab investigate how lifestyle choices affect brain health or delving into the motivations of Formula 1 racing drivers for her latest novel, “digging into things to find out root cause” is a satisfying pursuit for University of Iowa third-year psychology major and pre-med student Esha Patel.

Current and past HBC research study participants and others interested in how your participation makes an impact are cordially invited to the Health, Brain & Cognition Lab’s first-ever Open House. The event, scheduled for 1-4 p.m., Saturday, Nov. 16 at 340 Iowa Ave., Iowa City, is free, open to all, and a great opportunity for the public to get an inside look at the University of Iowa’s Psychological and Brain Sciences Department’s research facility downtown.

Welcome to the newest member of the Health, Brain & Cognition Lab team, Post Baccalaureate Research Assistant Alei Rehovsky. As Alei prepares for graduate school and a clinical and research career, she’ll be utilizing her psychological training and work experience as a psychometrist to recruit, screen and consent, and collect data from participants in the HBC Lab’s cognitive research projects.

Kelsey Baller, a post-baccalaureate research associate at the Health, Brain & Cognition Lab for the past three years, moved to St. Louis in August to begin a PhD program in Clinical Psychology at Washington University.

Dr. Myungjin Jung, a post-doctoral research scholar at the Health, Brain & Cognition Lab for the past year, has accepted a position as a tenure-track assistant professor in the Department of Kinesiology, Health Promotion and Recreation at the University of North Texas in Denton, where he will continue research on the effects of acute and chronic exercise on cognitive function and mentor master’s and doctoral students interested in studying the relationship between exercise and cognitive function.

The Health, Brain and Cognition Lab congratulates three-and-one-half-year team member, Dr. Marco Pipoly, who in late May successfully defended his thesis. Dr. Pipoly is currently preparing for his next career step as a post-doctoral scholar with Dr. Gagan Wig at the University of Texas – Dallas. There, he will continue research on how we keep our brain functioning despite the emergence of age-related brain pathology.

Congratulations to University of Iowa computer science major and HBC Lab undergraduate research assistant Zak Gilliam, who presented his first poster from the lab at the UI Computational Psychiatry Symposium April 19 and won first place.

Health, Brain, & Cognition Lab researcher and doctoral candidate Bryan Madero presented a poster on his dissertation topic, “Tertiary Sulci and Brain Aging: A Novel Approach to Cognitive Aging,” at the annual conference of the Cognitive Neuroscience Society, held April 13-16 in Toronto, Ontario, Canada.