Global fNIRS is a multidisciplinary project dedicated to advancing global health initiatives through the use of a low-cost, portable and non-invasive neuroimaging technology, functional near-infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS). Our goal is to provide tools which supplement current methods for assessing cognitive function of the developing brain in resource-poor settings. We believe that establishing earlier and more objective biomarkers of typical and atypical cognitive development will be of value in assessing interventional outcomes and risk prevention strategies.

The Brain Imaging for Global HealTh (BRIGHT) Project is a collaborative project led by a team of researchers from University College London, Birkbeck University of London, the Medical Research Council Units in the Gambia and Cambridge, as well as Cambridge University Hospitals. The project is a longitudinal study from birth to 24 months of age, following over 200 Gambian infants and 60 infants living in the UK.

The Brain Imaging for Global Health (BRIGHT) Project: Longitudinal cohort study protocol (Lloyd-Fox et al., 2024) → https://doi.org/10.12688/gatesopenres.14795.2

Other BRIGHT Project related papers:

• Habituation and novelty detection fNIRS brain responses in 5- and 8-month-old infants: The Gambia and UK (Lloyd-Fox et al., 2019) → https://doi.org/10.1111/desc.12817
• Implementing neuroimaging and eye tracking methods to assess neurocognitive development of young infants in low- and middle-income countries (Katus et al., 2019) → https://doi.org/10.12688/gatesopenres.12951.2
• fNIRS for Tracking Brain Development in the Context of Global Health Projects (Blasi et al., 2019) → https://doi.org/10.3390/photonics6030089
• Adaptation of the Mullen Scales of Early Learning for use among infants aged 5- to 24-months in rural Gambia (Milosavljevic et al., 2019) → https://doi.org/10.1111/desc.12808
• ERP markers are associated with neurodevelopmental outcomes in 1–5 month old infants in rural Africa and the UK (Katus et al., 2020) → https://doi.org/10.1016/j.neuroimage.2020.116591
• Standardising an infant fNIRS analysis pipeline to investigate neurodevelopment in global health (Bulgarelli et al., 2020) → https://doi.org/10.1364/BRAIN.2020.BM2C.2
• The Role of Iron in Brain Development: A Systematic Review (McCann et al., 2020) → https://doi.org/10.3390/nu12072001
• Longitudinal infant fNIRS channel-space analyses are robust to variability parameters at the group-level: An image reconstruction investigation (Collins-Jones et al., 2021) → https://doi.org/10.1016/j.neuroimage.2021.118068
• Breast Milk Micronutrients and Infant Neurodevelopmental Outcomes: A Systematic Review (Lockyer et al., 2021) → https://doi.org/10.3390/nu13113848
• Neural Marker of Habituation at 5 Months of Age Associated with Deferred Imitation Performance at 12 Months: A Longitudinal Study in the UK and The Gambia (Katus et al., 2022) → https://doi.org/10.3390/children9070988
• Longitudinal fNIRS and EEG metrics of habituation and novelty detection are correlated in 1–18-month-old infants (Katus et al., 2023) → https://doi.org/10.1016/j.neuroimage.2023.120153
• Socioeconomic and health predictors of perinatal mental health in a rural area of The Gambia (Milosavljevic et al., 2023) → https://doi.org/10.31219/osf.io/uw4z9
• Executive functioning skills and their environmental predictors among pre-school aged children in South Africa and The Gambia (Milosavljevic et al., 2023) → https://doi.org/10.1111/desc.13407
• Iron status in early infancy is associated with trajectories of cognitive development up to pre-school age in rural Gambia (McCann et al., 2023) → https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pgph.0002531
• Growth in early infancy drives optimal brain functional connectivity which predicts cognitive flexibility in later childhood (Bulgarelli et al., 2024) → https://doi.org/10.1101/2024.01.02.573930
• Cognitive control in infancy: Attentional predictors using a tablet-based measure (Macrae et al., 2024) → https://doi.org/10.1111/infa.12599
• It takes a village: Caregiver diversity and language contingency in the UK and rural Gambia (Katus et al., 2024) → https://doi.org/10.1016/j.infbeh.2023.101913