Dog Neuroscience 5 -kolby fenner

What task was used for this ground-breaking experiment? The researchers wanted to know if there is a different pattern of activity in the brain when the dog sees a hand-signal that means their owner is about to give them a treat, compared to when they see a hand-signal that means no treat. The hand signals were left hand held up to mean the dog was about to receive a piece of hot dog, and both hands pointing horizontally to each other to mean no hot dog was forthcoming. -kolby fenner

Dog Neuroscience 4 -kolby fenner

The dogs were trained using positive reinforcement, and had to lie still with their head in a chin rest. Once the dog was used to this, the chin rest was moulded to give a custom fit, because it’s important for the dog’s head not to move in order to allow the scan to be interpreted. Finally, they were ready for the real thing.  -kolby fenner

Dog Neuroscience 2 - kolby fenner

A team of scientists led by Gregory Berns at Emory University has successfully trained two dogs to go into the fMRI scanner and keep still long enough for a brain scan. Prof Berns says he got the idea from realizing what military dogs are trained to do – if a dog can parachute out of a plane with its handler, he thought, then surely it could do an fMRI. -kolby fenner

Dog Neuroscience 3 - kolby fenner

The dog training was complex and took place over several months. A mock-up of the scanner was made for each dog, including a replica head coil, a tube of the same size as the real thing, and a patient table within the tube with a head rest for the dog. Because dogs’ hearing is so sensitive, they also had to learn to wear headphones to protect their ears. The first times the scientists actually started the scan, the sound caused a startle reaction, so they played the sound throughout the training sessions to get the dog used to the noise that the machine makes.   -kolby fenner

Dog Neuroscience - kolby fenner

Check out How Dogs Love Us: A Neuroscientist and His Adopted Dog Decode the Canine Brain: Gregory Berns: 9780544114517: Amazon.com: Books   Guy trained his dog to hold still inside an fMRI.  He was able to map some of the dog's brain functioning. kolby fenner