Josh Faskowitz

Hi there! 👋

I’m a postdoc in the Section on Functional Imaging Methods (aka Peter Bandettini’s group) at the NIMH. I work on edgy fMRI 🧲 - thinking about ways to model brain’s functional patterns 🧠 in space 📍 and time ⏱️ and how we might represent our data in nice formats that computers can crunch and churn.

I completed my Ph.D. in 2021 under the supervision of Olaf Sporns at Indiana University and I did a postdoc year jointly with the Brain Networks & Behavior Lab (aka BetzelLab) and the Computational Cognitive Neuroscience Lab (aka SpornsLab). With this background, I would say that I’m part of a scientific community that examines brain architecture through the lens of network 🕸️ (+’graph theory’) and its applications. In other words, we attempt to comprehend the complexities of that oxygen-hungry jello-like blob 🧠 sloshing around in our csf-swimming pool (a.k.a skull) by conceptualizing it as a network of finely wired neurological components. An advantage of our network neuroscience approach is that we can attempt to clarify “complex organization” with intuitive algorithms and operations 💻. My grad work was supported by an NSF GRFP, the IU graduate school, and the psych department.

Check out my Github for scripts, code, and data related to these endeavors (projects on community detection in brain networks here and here! Also, some edgy tools here and here and here). I’ve also been compiling a list of openly-available brain network data, for all of us to enjoy. I’ve benefited greatly, learning from all y’all’s openly available code, so hopefully I can pass on the favor!

I studied neuro- and cog- science (and minored in marketing…go figure 🤷) at the University of Southern California (2014), and helped out in the USC Emotion and Cognition Lab. Following undergrad, I made the trek westward on the I-10 to Marina del Rey, where I worked as a research assistant for the USC Imaging Genetics Center under the mentorship of Neda Jahanshad. Here I assisted on a wide range of MRI projects (including Enigma), and picked up an affinity for bash scripting, data sharing, and non-linear registration techniques.

I’m originally from Orange County, CA. It’s a nice place with a very enjoyable shoreline 🌴. I’m an admirer of modern architecture, vectorfunk, music videos, and Google Earth 🌍. Additionally, I am fond of coffee, cheese, spy novels, prog-rock, trivia, watchin’ sports, grillin’ burgers, Tottenham Hotspur, buying books, pub trivia, Insta filters, atlas obscura, and sour beer. I’m an especially avid disc golf 🥏⛳️ and pickleball player 🥒🎾. Most importantly, I’m am exceptionally proud girl dad to a wonderful little baby, who shares my fondness of Richard Scarry and long afternoon naps.

Academic links

• Curriculum Vitae: some info on positions, papers, talks, and teaching.
• Google Scholar: publications, citation counts, and the usual scholarly bookkeeping.
• Publons: peer-review activity and publication-related metadata.
• Figshare: shared datasets, figures, and other research outputs.

Professional and semi-professional internet

• Twitter: science, links, and occasional non-science detours.
• LinkedIn: the formal career summary version of me.

Other corners of the internet

• LA Times interview: a very old but still amusing appearance from 1998.
• Leavy Library wall of scholars: apparently I made it onto a wall.
• High-school art: some older visual work from well before the brain-network era.