Dr Frini Karayanidis is a Professor in Psychology at the University of Newcastle (UON), Director of UON’s Functional Neuroimaging Lab and Co-Director of Hunter Medical Research Institute’s (HMRI) Healthy Mind Research Program.
Professor Karayanidis leads a multidisciplinary research program aimed at developing accessible composite vascular and neural brain biomarkers to track individual ageing trajectories and predict risk of age-related cognitive decline. This work uses novel methods for quantifying regional cerebral arterial health, patented by her USA collaborators at the University of Illinois, and currently only available in her lab in Australia.
It aims to establish proof-of-principle that arterial pulse signal can be recorded in primary health settings using commercial NIRS systems in order to derive a composite pulse-DOT measure as an early biomarker of brain arterial changes that predict subclinical changes in cognition in mid-late life. If implemented as part of regular primary healthcare, this approach can potentially empower individuals and their healthcare providers to make informed personalised choices to promote healthy ageing.
It can also provide a powerful measure for assessing the effectiveness of existing lifestyle interventions for promoting vascular and cognitive health and reversing or delaying cognitive decline.
Karayanidis has a strong publication track record, with over 110 publications (H-Index:44; >5700 citations). She has been awarded 67 grants (>$9.2M) from ARC, NHMRC, MRFF, NIH and Dementia Australia.
Her international standing is recognised in multiple prestigious awards: Fellow, Society for Psychophysiological Research (SPR); Lifetime Achievement Award, Australasian Society for Cognitive Neuroscience (ACNS); Fellow, Association for Psychological Science (APS).
