Katherine Bryant was awarded a 2023 ILCB post-doc fellowship to work with Adrien Meguerditchian (LPC) and Olivier Coulon (INT). Her project will address the anatomic changes that occur in baboon development from birth to adulthood, with a special focus on lateralization of grey and white matter. The analysis of these data will permit greater insight into the evolution of the substrate of human language. Additionally, her project will apply the same analysis to commonly studied model primate species, in order to create valuable comparative resources for researchers investigating cognitive processes in model species.
After training in evolutionary neuroanatomy and architectonics during her PhD with Todd Preuss (Yerkes Primate Research Center/Emory University, US), Katherine further trained in comparative neuroimaging methods with Rogier Mars (Radboud University, NL/University of Oxford, UK), eventually developing comprehensive white matter atlases for the chimpanzee and gibbon. Dr. Bryant’s long-term research goals are to contribute brain organization resources that offer insight into the evolution of large brains across mammalian taxa.