Dr. Yazhuo Kong
75th descendant of Confucius!
B.Eng: University of Science and Technology of China
Ph.D: University of Sheffield
I have moved to Beijing since December 2016 as Research Professor and Director of the Pain Neuroimaging and Translational Research Centre, Institute of Psychology, Chinese Academy of Sciences.
Joe Yazhuo Kong
Ph.D
Honorary Research Fellow
- Pain Neuroimaging analysis
Pain neuroscience, spinal cord MRI, neuropathic pain, neurodegeneration diseases
spinal MRI
My research focuses on quantitative MRI (structural, diffusion, spectroscopy and fMRI) of human spinal cord with applications to pain and neurodegeneration diseases.
The spinal cord is the first part of the central nervous system (CNS) involved in the transmission of somatosensory information from the body periphery to the brain, as well as the last part of the CNS involved in relaying motor signals to the body periphery. Non-invasive functional MRI offers the possibility of studying spinal cord function and role in sensory, motor and pain processes. However functional MRI of the spinal cord is very challenging due to its small cross-sectional area, magnetic susceptibility differences in tissues adjacent to the cord, as well as the influence of physiological noise.
I aim to develop optimised protocols to analyse spinal cord fMRI including reliable pre-processing, physiological noise correction and robust group co-registration.
Recently for the first time we have discovered biologically plausible and spatially distinct resting state networks (RSNs) exist in the human spinal cord (Kong 2014 PNAS). Check out the interview by Nature NeuroPod about this work:
http://www.nature.com/neurosci/neuropod/index-2014-12-19.html
Key publications
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Intrinsically organized resting state networks in the human spinal cord.
Journal article
Kong Y. et al, (2014), Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A, 111, 18067 - 18072
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Structural imaging of the cervical spinal cord with suppressed CSF signal using DANTE pulse trains.
Journal article
Li L. et al, (2015), Magn Reson Med, 74, 971 - 977
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Assessment of physiological noise modelling methods for functional imaging of the spinal cord.
Journal article
Kong Y. et al, (2012), Neuroimage, 60, 1538 - 1549
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Stimulus site and modality dependence of functional activity within the human spinal cord.
Journal article
Brooks JCW. et al, (2012), J Neurosci, 32, 6231 - 6239
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Brain imaging signatures of the relationship between epidermal nerve fibers and heat pain perception.
Journal article
Tseng M-T. et al, (2015), Neuroimage, 122, 288 - 297
Recent publications
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Pain in patients with transverse myelitis and its relationship to aquaporin 4 antibody status.
Journal article
Kong Y. et al, (2016), J Neurol Sci, 368, 84 - 88
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Isolated new onset 'atypical' optic neuritis in the NMO clinic: serum antibodies, prognoses and diagnoses at follow-up.
Journal article
Piccolo L. et al, (2016), J Neurol, 263, 370 - 379
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Disambiguating Pharmacodynamic Efficacy from Behavior with Neuroimaging: Implications for Analgesic Drug Development.
Journal article
Wanigasekera V. et al, (2016), Anesthesiology, 124, 159 - 168
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Brain imaging signatures of the relationship between epidermal nerve fibers and heat pain perception.
Journal article
Tseng M-T. et al, (2015), Neuroimage, 122, 288 - 297
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Amiloride Clinical Trial In Optic Neuritis (ACTION) protocol: a randomised, double blind, placebo controlled trial.
Journal article
McKee JB. et al, (2015), BMJ Open, 5