Khula LEAP 

The PINE Lab, along with an international team of co-investigators and researchers, are collaborating on this project to investigate the neurodevelopment of executive function skills over the first 3 years of life in South Africa and Malawi. We will use both MRI and EEG across cultures to identify the factors that promote healthy development and the sensitive windows for intervention. Some core questions that this study aims to address are: What are the neurodevelopmental pathways shaping executive function skills across different cultures? What are the scalable brain markers of healthy, at-risk, and resilient executive function development? How do early experiences, microbiome composition and activity, and other interventive factors, shape early brain markers within- and across-cultures? What are the culture- and country-specific factors that promote executive function development? We aim to use the findings of this study to develop culturally specific interventions that can promote healthy brain development.