Announcing: Defining and Dismantling Anti-Black Racism in Neuroscience

NeuWrite is proud to announce our new series: Defining and Dismantling Anti-Black Racism in Neuroscience, in partnership with Black in Neuro and with generous funding from the Wu Tsai Neurosciences Institute and the Biomedical Association for the Interest of Minority Students (BioAIMS) at Stanford.

 With this series, we will remind ourselves and our readers that science is an inherently human endeavor; anything that affects humans affects science. We will examine the ways that science, politics, and our societal value systems are entangled with one another. We will also explore how each part of the scientific process—who conducts science, what questions we ask and why, how we investigate those questions, how our data are interpreted, and who benefits from or has access to the products of our science—is touched by and vulnerable to anti-Black racism and white supremacy.

As scientists and science enthusiasts, we have a responsibility to work towards dismantling white supremacy in science. Even non-white scientists may implicitly or explicitly support these power structures in order to survive and thrive in STEM. This series aims give people the tools to recognize, question, call-out, and begin to dismantle anti-Black racism in science.

The Series

In this series, we will reconsider what it means to strive for objectivity and see how oppressive power structures can shape the scientific process. We will learn about the ways that anti-Black racism pervades neuroscience, both historically and today. We will unpack bias in psychological studies and diagnoses, and consider the very real impacts of racism on psychological and neural health. We will highlight anti-racist interventions and consider strategies that we can all implement to pursue equity and justice in STEM. Throughout the series and in spotlight articles, we will also elevate Black contributions to neuroscience.

In reading, writing, and talking about racism in neuroscience, we hope to educate ourselves and become better anti-racist scientists. In centering the work of Black academics throughout the series, we hope to emphasize the critical role that these researchers play in our pursuit of knowledge. In highlighting successful (and failed) anti-racist strategies, we hope to lay a path towards more justice in academia. And, finally, in publishing our work we hope to provide tools for others to take this anti-racist journey with us.

Meet Our Team

Senior Editors

We have had the great pleasure to work with neuroscientists from across the country through our partnership with Black in Neuro. Each piece in this series was written in collaboration with a Senior Editor. Meet our Senior Editing team:

Ashlea Morgan is a PhD candidate in the Neurobiology and Behavior Program at Columbia University. She studies how signaling of serotonin in the medial prefrontal cortex drives the ability to adapt and behave flexibly. She is a writer and blogger and is passionate about telling diverse stories of science and scientists, including her own.

Tia Donaldson is a graduate student in Psychology at the University of New Mexico. She uses mice to understand how neuromodulators influence learning and memory. She is a proud first-generation student and is passionate about sharing her love of science and the brain with others.

Gabriella Muwanga is a Neurosciences graduate student in the Tawfik and Airan labs at Stanford University. Her research focuses on the mechanisms of acute and chronic pain, and she is especially interested in the factors that contribute to the acute-to-chronic pain transition. Through her research, she hopes to identify new targets for pain treatment and contribute to developing novel therapies for acute and chronic pain. She is passionate about science communication and believes it is a way to partner with the public as we make fundamental discoveries about our world.

Victor Ekuta is an MIT linQ Catalyst Fellow, MD Candidate at UC San Diego School of Medicine, and a proud member of Black in Neuro. He is passionate about advancing brain health equity and has completed several innovative projects including a Doris Duke Clinical Research Fellowship on Alzheimer's Disease. He is also an advocate for diversity in neuroscience and currently serves as the MIT Online Science Technology and Engineering Community (MOSTEC): Neuroscience and Connectomics Instructor, where he combines his love of neuroscience with his passion for diversifying STEM. In the future, he plans to specialize in academic neurology as a physician-scientist-advocate, employing novel approaches to treat human brain disease, combat health disparities, and boost diversity in STEM.

Writers

Isabel Low is a neuroscience graduate student in Lisa Giocomo’s lab, where she uses virtual reality to study how our mood impacts cognitive processing. When she’s not wrangling mice to play video games, Isabel enjoys writing fiction and non-fiction, climbing things, and cooking for her friends and roommates. Her passion is introducing non-scientists to all the excitement, chaos, and wonder behind the scientific process.

Arielle Keller is a neuroscience graduate student working in the Williams PanLab. She is investigating how the human brain directs attention toward its goals despite abundant distractions (squirrel!) and how this process can go awry with mental illness. Arielle loves reading, writing, and editing pieces for the NeuroBlog, as well as learning from real-life science writers through our workshop series.

Manasi Iyer is a neuroscience PhD student in Brad Zuchero’s lab. She studies the biology of non-neuronal brain cells (glia!) and how they contribute to brain function. In NeuWrite West, Manasi works as a part of both the podcast and editing teams. Outside of lab and science writing, Manasi loves to cook and has made it her personal goal to meet every dog on Stanford’s campus.

Grace Huckins is a neuroscience graduate student in Russ Poldrack's lab. She works on using brain scans to build better explanations of mental illness. Outside of the lab, she works as a freelance science journalist, and her writing has appeared in WIRED, Scientific American, and Popular Science, among others. You can read her writing here. She also enjoys running, cooking, and going on adventures with her German shepherd/husky mix, Winnie.

Jessica Verhein is an MD/PhD (medical and graduate) student in the Shenoy and Newsome labs at Stanford University. She works with video-game-playing monkeys to study how the patterned activity of lots of individual brain cells reflects plans and choices about upcoming movements. She is also passionate about working to make science and medicine more accessible to and helpful for all types of humans, especially to groups who’ve been excluded, overlooked, or mistreated in the past.

Noori Chai

Artists

Sedona Ewbank

Avery Krieger - find his photography here

The artwork for this piece and the series banner is by Avery Krieger. Here is his description of the photo: “Ta Prohm, a UNESCO world heritage site, is unique in that the temple is mostly left in the same condition as it was when it was ‘rediscovered.’ Overgrown trees burst forth from major parts of the complex and roots intertwine with the foundations.”

Editors

Noori Chai, Madeline Cooper, Sedona Ewbank, Alex Gonzalez, Grace Huckins, Manasi Iyer, Arielle Keller, Christina Kim, Isabel Low, Michelle Pang, Mari Sosa, Jessica Verhein

Funding Support

Finally, this series would not have been possible without generous funding from Stanford’s Wu Tsai Neuroscience Institute and Stanford BioAIMS. We thank them for their continued support.