Programme

The UPV/EHU has several classrooms and workspaces on the Gipuzkoa Campus. In addition, the BCBL has sufficient work spaces to accommodate doctoral students.

The UPV/EHU has the General Research Services (SGIker) n place. On the other hand, the BCBL, which is where students will carry out their research on their doctoral theses, has the necessary material resources to make research work easier for doctoral students. There are spaces for them to develop their work (rooms for scholarship holders and doctoral students), in addition to specific laboratories. Below is a description of the equipment of the BCBL laboratories. The BCBL has exceptional facilities, probably the best in Spain in the field of Cognitive Neuroscience, which support cutting-edge research on Cognitive Neuroscience. The behavioural laboratory consists of eight soundproofed booths for behavioural experiments. Each booth is equipped with an experimental system with a standardised high-quality setting, which enables collecting data of the times of reaction, for tasks where the answer is given pressing buttons or to measure denomination latencies. The booths can be used for individual test sessions, in which one experimenter tracks a single participant, and for tests of up to 4 participants simultaneously. Groups of participants can be monitored via webcams. The eye movement laboratory is equipped with three EyeLink 2K (SR Research Ltd.) eye movement recording systems that enable real-time reading tasks and experiments to be recorded using the "Visual World Paradigm". The EyeLink 2K provides an excellent sampling rate (2000 Hz) and is particularly suitable for real-time data collection. The EyeLink 2k can be used to track either one eye or both eyes, and the system is also perfectly compatible with most contact lenses and glasses. The baby laboratory (BabyLAB) has methods and techniques to discover the first steps of human language development. Here, visual habituation procedures, head turns preferences, and intermodal gaze preference may be recorded for the evaluation of general linguistic skills of pre-verbal infants (3 to 12 months of age), and to investigate the syntactic and lexical knowledge of infants up to 28 months of age. Behavioural measurement is completed with an electrocardiogram (ECG) system that records the rate of the baby's heartbeat during tasks. ECG activity reflects the way in which children's attention is being modulated and regulated in the context of a specific language experience. It is also equipped with EEG/ERP and NIRS suitable for infants and children. BabyLAB offers a state-of-the-art study site within an exceptional setting to research language development in monolingual and bilingual languages. The EEG lab. The centre is equipped with four EEG systems located in soundproof booths. Each booth is equipped with a BrainAmp DC® amplifier: in addition to the normal features of an AC amplifier, the DC recording mode allows multiple hardware filtering options. The recording software (Brain Recorder®) enables controlling all the options of the amplifier, including the switch for switching from DC recording mode to AC mode, as well as for selecting different filter bandwidths. The DC BrainAmp® is more stable than older EEG systems in a number of applications and allows simultaneous EEG/TMS and EEG/MEG inputs from the Brain Computer Interface and Neurofeedback. For further EEG/ERP analysis, Vision Analyzer®2.1 software is available on all computers via a network key. The MEG lab. Magnetoencephalography (MEG) provides a non-invasive method for recording cortical activity with exceptional temporal resolution and fine spatial resolution. The BCBL MEG installation houses a 306-sensor Elekta Neuromag® device (204 flat gradiometers and 102 magnetometers, arranged in a hull structure) with 16 digital triggering lines and 8 analogue auxiliary input channels. The installation allows the occurrence of auditory and visual stimuli, and the measurement can be made with the participant standing or seated. The MEG device also includes an integrated 64-channel EEG system (60 individual channels and 4 differential electrodes) for the simultaneous collection of MEG and EEG measurements that can be acquired at a sampling rate of up to 8 kHz in either AC or DC. Throughout the experimental session, the participant's position within the scanner is acquired so that the data can be linked independently from the acquired anatomical MRI images. The BCBL installation includes passive protection to reduce external noise and MaxFilter software, which filters out artefacts and internal and external noise sources. For data analysis, Elekta Neuromag® includes advanced analysis software, including powerful tools for visualization and modelling of recorded data sources. Magnetic Resonance Laboratory. The BCBL is equipped with a Siemens 3T Prism magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) device for functional, structural and diffusion imaging. This equipment uses an advanced acquisition system with a 64-channel RF coil, which provides high image quality and enhanced performance with IPAT (Integrated Parallel Acquisition Techniques), excellent workflow, and offers wide anatomical coverage with a maximum field of view (F0V) of 50 cm. The Siemens protocols have different sequences for the acquisition of functional images (BOLD), structural high-resolution images and diffusion images that allow to reconstruct the diffusion tensors. On the other hand, the BCBL has a laboratory within an elementary school and high-school equipped with two behavioural cabins, an EEG system and an ocular movement recording system, the same as the systems that have been described to exist in the laboratory of the BCBL building. This way, access to the school sample is guaranteed.

The UPV/EHU has Campus Libraries in place. The library provides electronic access to a large number of scientific journals in the field of Cognitive Neuroscience.