Publications

  • Riis T & Feldman D (2024). Device for Multifocal Delivery of Ultrasound Into Deep Brain Regions in Humans. IEEE transactions on bio-medical engineering. Vol. 71, 660668660-668. Published, 01/01/2024.
  • Webb TD & Wilson MG (2023). Sustained modulation of primate deep brain circuits with focused ultrasonic waves. Brain stimulation. Vol. 16, 798805798-805. Published, 06/01/2023.
  • Riis T (2022). Effective Ultrasonic Stimulation in Human Peripheral Nervous System. IEEE transactions on bio-medical engineering. Vol. 69, 152215-22. Published, 01/01/2022.
  • Riis TS (2021). Acoustic properties across the human skull. Ultrasonics. Vol. 119, 106591106591. Published, 12/01/2021.
  • Gaur P, Casey KM, Kubanek J, Li N, Mohammadjavadi M, Saenz Y, Glover GH, Bouley DM & Pauly KB (2020). Histologic safety of transcranial focused ultrasound neuromodulation and magnetic resonance acoustic radiation force imaging in rhesus macaques and sheep. Brain stimulation. Vol. 13, 804-814. Published, 02/21/2020.
  • Kubanek J (2018). Neuromodulation with transcranial focused ultrasound. Neurosurgical focus. Vol. 44, E14. Published, 11/01/2018.
  • Kubanek J, Shukla P, Das A, Baccus SA & Goodman MB (2018). Ultrasound Elicits Behavioral Responses through Mechanical Effects on Neurons and Ion Channels in a Simple Nervous System. The Journal of neuroscience : the official journal of the Society for Neuroscience. Vol. 38, 3081-3091. Published, 11/01/2018.
  • Kubanek J (2018). Optimal decision making and matching are tied through diminishing returns. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America. Vol. 114, 8499-8504. Published, 06/01/2018.
  • Kubanek J & Snyder LH (2018). Reward Size Informs Repeat-Switch Decisions and Strongly Modulates the Activity of Neurons in Parietal Cortex. Cerebral cortex (New York, N.Y. : 1991). Vol. 27, 447-459. Published, 01/01/2018.
  • Kubanek J, Snyder LH & Abrams RA (2016). Reward and punishment act as distinct factors in guiding behavior. Cognition. Vol. 139, 154-67. Published, 12/01/2016.
  • Kubanek J & Schalk G (2016). NeuralAct: A Tool to Visualize Electrocortical (ECoG) Activity on a Three-Dimensional Model of the Cortex. Neuroinformatics. Vol. 13, 167-74. Published, 02/01/2016.
  • Kubanek J & Mooshagian E (2015). Cognitive and action-based aspects of developing decisions in parietal cortex. The Journal of neuroscience : the official journal of the Society for Neuroscience. Vol. 35, 8382-3. Published, 08/01/2015.
  • Kubanek J, Li JM & Snyder LH (2015). Motor role of parietal cortex in a monkey model of hemispatial neglect. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America. Vol. 112, E2067-72. Published, 06/01/2015.
  • Kubanek J & Snyder LH (2015). Reward-based decision signals in parietal cortex are partially embodied. The Journal of neuroscience : the official journal of the Society for Neuroscience. Vol. 35, 4869-81. Published, 06/01/2015.
  • Kubanek J, Snyder LH, Brunton BW, Brody CD & Schalk G (2014). A low-frequency oscillatory neural signal in humans encodes a developing decision variable. NeuroImage. Vol. 83, 795-808. Published, 06/01/2014.
  • Kubanek J, Brunner P, Gunduz A, Poeppel D & Schalk G (2013). The tracking of speech envelope in the human cortex. (pp. e53398). Vol. 8. PloS one. Published, 06/01/2013.
  • Kubanek J & Kaplan DM (2012). Evidence for a decision variable in the human motor system. (pp. 8110-1). Vol. 32. The Journal of neuroscience : the official journal of the Society for Neuroscience. Published, 09/01/2012.
  • Kubánek J, Miller KJ, Ojemann JG, Wolpaw JR & Schalk G (2010). Decoding flexion of individual fingers using electrocorticographic signals in humans. Journal of neural engineering. Vol. 6, 066001. Published, 02/01/2010.
  • Schalk G, Kubánek J, Miller KJ, Anderson NR, Leuthardt EC, Ojemann JG, Limbrick D, Moran D, Gerhardt LA & Wolpaw JR (2008). Decoding two-dimensional movement trajectories using electrocorticographic signals in humans. Journal of neural engineering. Vol. 4, 264-75. Published, 08/01/2008.

Research Statement

Mental and neurological disorders are the world's leading cause of disability. Drug treatments have often been inadequate and have contributed to an alarming addiction situation. We need to be able to diagnose and treat the neural source of brain disorders. Toward that goal, our lab develops:
  1. Minimally invasive methods that enable to modulate individual neural circuits transiently and systematicall—one by one—until identifying the set that leads to a relief of a given sign or symptom.
  2. Methods for durable treatment of the involved circuit activity and connectivity.
This work will enable us to move beyond prescribing systemic drugs by addressing the source of a problem in each individual.
At the basic science level, the ability to modulate (and in particular, suppress) neural circuits noninvasively and thereby systematically will lead to new, causal studies of how individual brain circuits are involved in specific behaviors in humans.

Research Keywords

  • Neural Engineering
  • Brain Disorders

Presentations

  • Neurology Grand Rounds. Invited Talk/Keynote, Presented, 10/18/2023.
  • International Neuromodulation Society World Cogress; presenter. Conference Paper, Refereed, Presented, 05/21/2022.
  • American Neuromodulation Society (session chair and presenter): Ultrasonic neuromodulation: State of the art. Invited Talk/Keynote, Presented, 01/20/2022.
  • Baylor College of Medicine: Effective multifocal neuromodulation. Invited Talk/Keynote, Presented, 07/22/2021.
  • Brainbox Initiative: Noninvasive deep brain neuromodulation with ultrasound. Invited Talk/Keynote, Presented, 09/24/2020.
  • Remotely-controlled release of pharmaceutics. Department of Pharmaceutics and Pharmaceutical Chemistry, University of Utah. Invited Talk/Keynote, Presented, 02/10/2020.
  • North American Neuromodulation Society. Noninvasive targeted neuromodulation. Las Vegas, NV, Jan 25, 2020. Invited Talk/Keynote, Presented, 01/25/2020.
  • Annual Symposium of the International Society for Therapeutic Ultrasound, Keynote Speaker. Ultrasound for neural interventions. Barcelona, Spain, June 14, 2019. Invited Talk/Keynote, Presented, 06/14/2019.
  • International Neuromodulation Society. Remote, brain-region-specific control of choice behavior in primates. Sydney, Australia, May 27, 2019. Conference Paper, Refereed, Presented, 05/27/2019.
  • Neurology Grand Rounds. Focused Ultrasound for Targeted Noninvasive Treatments of Brain Disorders. University of Utah, March 6, 2019. Invited Talk/Keynote, Presented, 03/06/2019.
  • 3rd International Brain Stimulation Conference. Transcranial ultrasound selectively biases decision-making in primates. Vancouver, Canada, February 27, 2019. Invited Talk/Keynote, Presented, 02/27/2019.
  • Annual Symposium of the International Society for Therapeutic Ultrasound. Ultrasound for neural interventions. Barcelona, Spain, June 14, 2019. Invited Talk/Keynote, Accepted, 02/19/2019.
  • Neurosurgery Grand Rounds. Focused Ultrasound for Targeted Noninvasive Therapies. University of Utah, January 23, 2019. Invited Talk/Keynote, Presented, 01/23/2019.

Research Groups

  • Joshua Whiting, Graduate Student. 01/01/2024 - present.
  • Keisuke Tsunoda, Postdoc. Biomedical Engineering. 10/10/2023 - 01/14/2027. Awards/Scholarships/Stipends: Japanese Society for Advancement of Science.
  • Carter Lybbert, Graduate Student. BME. 10/04/2023 - present.
  • Jude Werth, Undergraduate Student. 09/11/2023 - present. Awards/Scholarships/Stipends: UROP.
  • Audri Dara, Undergraduate Student. 09/03/2023 - present.
  • Luke Loehding, Undergraduate Student. 05/15/2023 - present. Awards/Scholarships/Stipends: UROP.
  • Jeff Winter, Graduate Student. BME. 02/05/2023 - present.

Languages

  • Czech, fluent.
  • English, fluent.
  • French, basic.
  • German, fluent.
  • Spanish, fluent.

Geographical Regions of Interest

  • Americas

Grants, Contracts & Research Gifts

  • Device for noninvasive treatments of brain disorders. PI: Kubanek. Ben B. and Iris M. Margolis Foundation, 11/21/2019 - 11/20/2020. Total project budget to date: $70,000.00
  • KUBANEK R00. PI: KUBANEK,JAN. NIH NATL INST NEUROLOG DISORDE, 07/01/2019 - 05/31/2020. Total project budget to date: $248,664.00

Software Titles

  • Remus: System for Remote Deep Brain Interventions. The system programmatically delivers therapeutic ultrasound into deep brain regions. www.onetarget.us/tools. Release Date: 10/20/2021. Inventors: Kubanek, Webb.
  • NeuralAct. NeuralAct allows researchers to visualize cortical activity acquired using ECoG, EEG, MEG, or DOT on a 3D model of the cortex. The figure on the left shows an example of a typical use of this tool. The tool has been used to produce cortical activation images and image sequences in several recent studies using ECoG. The tool is written in matlab. The package is thoroughly documented and includes a demo. Release Date: 03/18/2015. Inventors: Kubanek J., Schalk G.