CourtesyA collaborative study between Wichita State University, the University of Kansas Medical Center and a Kansas State University-led team of psychological sciences researchers has received a prestigious five-year, $10.6 million Centers of Biomedical Research Excellence (COBRE) grant.
WSU will receive a sub-award for their collaboration with KSU, totaling $1,781,344. The grant will go toward two research projects. Rui Ni, WSU associate professor of psychology and project leader for both projects, plans on using this grant to further his research and to help others.
“The project will focus on the neuronal plasticity among older adults,” says Ni. “We’ll develop training procedures to improve their visual cognitive functions and look for transferred learning effects on driving performance.”
Ni will use $1,008,870 of the sub-award to fund his project, and the remaining $772,474 will go toward a state-of-the-art 3D high-fidelity driving simulator that will use advanced technology, such as eye tracking, to study driving behavior.
Ni and his colleagues are working on finding a space big enough for the driving simulator, but they hope it will be open to research communities in the Wichita area and throughout Kansas by next summer.
“I think the ultimate goal is to improve driving safety among older drivers and help them to live a happy, safe and more independent life,” says Ni.
Jeremy Patterson, director of the Center for Interdisciplinary Creativity, is excited for this opportunity and looks forward to following Ni and his colleagues’ progress.
“This is a wonderful and deserving achievement for Dr. Ni and collaborators at KSU,” says Patterson. “The purpose of the COBRE funds are to enhance an institution’s biomedical research infrastructure and build relationships with other researchers.”
Ni and his colleagues at KSU spent nearly two years to prepare the original application and another two years to file the resubmission before winning this COBRE grant.
“This would not be possible without the strong support from the former chair, Dr. Alex Chaparro, and the current chair, Dr. Rhonda Louis, of the Psychology Department,” says Ni.
This is the first major COBRE grant sub-award to be received by WSU.