Dr. Whitney Hindmarch

Project Manager

I completed my BSc at the University of Victoria in Biology & Psychology and my PhD at the University of Calgary studying the biological mechanisms of fate decision in male germline stem cells. After completing my PhD, I worked as a Postdoctoral Fellow at the University of Calgary in the area of DNA damage and aging with a focus on telomere biology. I then joined the Ward of the 21st Century (W21C) Research and Innovation Centre at the University of Calgary as a Research Associate with a research focus on aging, dementia and health care quality improvement for people living with dementia. While working at W21C, I also developed a science literacy course that aims to make scientific literature more accessible to the general public. In the Bray Lab, I am a Project Manager working to develop and implement a research platform for the Calgary Centre for Child & Adolescent Mental Health. This new and exciting research initiative will facilitate multimodal research in child and adolescent mental health as well as give all youth that access the center an opportunity to participate in research.

Kate Godfrey, BSc

PhD Candidate, Neuroscience

I completed my BSc Neuroscience degree at the University of Lethbridge in 2017, where my undergraduate research work was focused on motivation and reward. In the Bray Neuroimaging Lab I am interested in investigating relationships between measures of reward network function and clinical features of autism spectrum disorder including intense interests, social communication, and suicidal thoughts and behaviors.

Kirk Graff, BSc & BEd

PhD Candidate, Neuroscience

I'm back at the University of Calgary after previously completing a BSc and a BEd here. I work with functional MRI to study how the brain changes in typically developing young children (ages 4-6). I’m interested in what connections within the brain are most similar from person to person, and what connections are most unique to each individual. My goal is to better understand cognition and what allows us to establish and maintain our individual identities. My other research focus is on comparing methodologies in functional MRI with children. There’s a lot of variability in how researchers process data, and most procedures have been established with adults. I hope to increase the knowledge of the pros and cons of different approaches when working with data collected from children.

Maya Sohn, BSc

PhD Student, Medical Sciences

I completed my BSc Honours in Neuroscience at the University of Calgary in 2019. I am interested in characterizing the neurobiological basis of suicide risk and developing suicide specific treatments. My current research uses advanced MRI techniques and non-invasive brain stimulation to characterize suicide risk in psychiatric populations.

Ryann Tansey, BSc

PhD Candidate, Neuroscience

I graduated with a B.Sc. in Combined Biology & Psychology from the University of Victoria in 2017. I’m very interested in how differences of cognitive abilities in both typically developing individuals and clinical neuropsychiatric populations are reflected in brain structure and function. My research in the Bray Lab uses fMRI to investigate how the between-subject similarity of attention network activity in young, typically developing children relates to attention ability. With this research, I hope to achieve a greater understanding of how specific differences of attention skills between children are represented in brain functioning.

Shefali Rai, BASc

PhD Candidate, Neuroscience

I completed my BASc Honours degree in Chemical Engineering at the University of Waterloo in 2013. In the Bray lab, I am working with functional MRI to gain insight on unique brain network features. Most of the work in this field has been done in adult populations and through my research I hope to gain a better understanding of how individual brain networks are distinct in typically developing children.

Sakshi Kaur, BHSc

Masters Student

I completed my Bachelor's in Health Sciences, majoring in Biomedical Sciences, in 2021. My undergraduate research focused on characterizing tactile processing in early childhood and its development into adulthood using vibrotactile psychophysical data. For my undergraduate honors thesis, I used vibrotactile data to investigate the effects of aerobic exercise on adults with persistent post-concussive symptoms. My current research uses MRI techniques to investigate white matter development in young children born preterm.

Amanda Ip, MSc

Research Assistant

I completed my undergraduate degree in Chemical Engineering with a Biomedical Specialization followed by a MSc in Biomedical Engineering at the University of Calgary. My duties primarily involve scheduling visits and collecting data for the Visual-spatial attention development in early childhood study and the Attention in early childhood: risk factors and intervention response study. I also assist with the MRI scanning for these studies as well as supporting the students and postdoctoral fellows in the Bray lab administratively.