Dr Jacob M. Levenstein is a Research Fellow in Neuroimaging at USC’s Thompson Institute with broad interests that include neurophysiology, neuropsychology and brain stimulation.
Since 2012, he has been involved in brain imaging research, working across several world-leading neuroimaging institutes.
Dr Levenstein completed his DPhil (PhD) at the University of Oxford within the Wellcome Centre for Integrative Neuroimaging (WIN/FMRIB).
In 2016, he was awarded a five-year National Institutes of Health Oxford-Cambridge Scholar Fellowship. He conducted part of his PhD (and subsequent Post-doc) at the National Institutes of Health within the Section on Functional Imaging Methods (sFIM).
His PhD research focused on the use of functional MRI (fMRI), functional MR spectroscopy (fMRS) and MR Spectroscopic Imaging (MRSI) to measure task-induced modulation of neurochemicals and BOLD signals within the human brain. His PhD work also focused on implementing lesion-symptom mapping techniques for evaluating brain-behavioural relationships in patients following stroke.
From 2015 to 2016, Dr Levenstein was Laboratory Manager for the Oxford Cognitive Neuropsychological Centre at the University of Oxford. Here, he processed and analysed clinical brain images of stroke, while also developing a database for accessing patients’ behavioural and imaging datasets.
He completed a Master of Science (MSc) degree in Psychological Research within the Department of Experimental Psychology at the University of Oxford. His dissertation demonstrated the use of resting-state MRI functional connectivity to differentially explain the efficacy of brain stimulation in modulating participants’ behavioural performance.
Dr Levenstein was trained as an MRI Research Technician at Massachusetts General Hospital/Athinoula A. Martinos Center for Biomedical Imaging, where he applied several MRI modalities to measure the human motor system in healthy participants and those affected by movement disorders.
He completed his undergraduate degree with honours from Endicott College, graduating with a self-directed major in Cognitive Studies and a minor in Philosophy.