September 2009

Curriculum Vitae

Nathan A. Gates, M.A., M.Phil.


Cognitive Neuroscience Department, Unit 50

New York State Psychiatric Institute    

1051 Riverside Drive

New York, NY 10032, USA

(212) 543-5459

gatesna@pi.cpmc.columbia.edu

http://psychophysiology.cpmc.columbia.edu/team/ng.html

 

 

Neuropsychology Doctoral Program

The Graduate Center and Queens College

at The City University of New York

 


EDUCATION

The Graduate Center and Queens College of the City University of New York; New York, NY

Ph.D. in Neuropsychology; expected November, 2009

Advisors: Gerard Bruder, Ph.D., Jürgen Kayser, Ph.D., Craig Tenke, Ph.D.

Thesis: “Interaction of intensity and deviance on auditory event-related potentials in healthy adults and depressed patients”

 

The Graduate Center and Queens College of the City University of New York; New York, NY

Masters of Philosophy; May, 2008

 

The Graduate Center and Queens College of the City University of New York; New York, NY

Masters of Arts; May, 2007

Advisors: Jürgen Kayser, Ph.D., Joan Borod, Ph.D.

Thesis: “Event-related brain potential (ERP) indices and behavioral measures of the emotional Stroop task among healthy adults.”

 

University of South Florida; Tampa, FL

Bachelors of Arts in Psychology; May, 2003

Advisors: Emanuel Donchin, Ph.D.; Cynthia Cimino, Ph.D.


RESEARCH INTERESTS

My work focuses on understanding how the brain effectively processes information within a complex environment and identifying neurophysiological factors contributing to information processing deficits within psychiatric populations. I am interested in investigating the neural mechanisms underlying attentional control, specifically, a person’s ability to attend to or ignore specific stimuli within the external and/or internal environment. In addition to neurocognitive behavioral testing, I apply advanced analytical techniques to high-density EEG/ERP data recordings from healthy and patient groups to gain information about the spatiotemporal structure of attentional control.

 

Currently, I am investigating the neurophysiological characteristics of information processing within the auditory modality by employing a modified mismatch negativity (MMN) paradigm. The modified paradigm is designed to isolate primary sensory perception from attentional processes related to deviance detection. The use of advanced EEG/ERP analytical tools (e.g., PCA, CSD, and BESA) help to disentangle the spatial and temporal overlap among these brain processes. Comparing patient and control groups will test specific hypotheses regarding neurophysiological and cognitive deficits associated with major depressive disorder and schizophrenia. This study also aims to test the effectiveness of utilizing EEG/ERP measures as clinical predictors of successful treatment response in psychiatric disorders.

 

I have a continuing interest in studying the interaction of emotional regulation and attentional control. Employing the “emotional Stroop” task offers the ability to activate sensory, cognitive, and emotional brain processes simultaneously through the presentation of a single visual stimulus. Stimulus and response related activity associated with detecting a stimulus feature (color) is studied with respect to varying levels of interference from task-irrelevant stimulus features (meaning) and stimulus-elicited emotional reactions.

 

In order to expand and strengthen the skills I have acquired in my doctoral training thus far, I intend to pursue additional training and experience with other neuroimaging techniques (e.g., fMRI, event-related time-frequency analysis) and clinical populations in a postdoctoral position that complements my research interests.

 

HONORS AND AWARDS

2008    Doctoral Student Research Grant; The Graduate Center at the City University of New York

2006    Travel Award for 3rd Annual Joint Meeting of The EEG and Clinical Neuroscience

            Society ECNS and The International Society for Neuroimaging in Psychiatry – ISNIP;

            Boston, MA.

 

2003    Magna Cum Laude

2002    PAR Scholarship for Excellence in Psychology Award


ASSOCIATION / MEMBERSHIPS

2004-Present; Society of Psychophysiological Research (SPR)

2006-Present; The EEG and Clinical Neuroscience Society (ECNS)

2005-Present; American Psychological Association (APA)

2005-Present; American Psychological Association of Graduate Students (APAGS)

2004-Present; International Neuropsychological Society (INS)

2004-Present; National Psychologist Trainee Register

 

PROFESSIONAL ACTIVITIES

ad hoc reviewer for the  journals Clinical Neurophysiology, Biological Psychology, and International Journal of Psychophysiology

 

RESEARCH EXPERIENCE

Department of Biopsychology New York State Psychiatric Institute; New York, NY

Assistant Research Scientist; August 2003-Present

Supervisors: Gerard Bruder, Ph.D.; Jürgen Kayser, Ph.D.; Craig Tenke, Ph.D.

 

Department of Psychology, University of South Florida; Tampa, FL

Honors Thesis; August 2002 - May 2003

Supervisor: Emanuel Donchin, Ph.D.

 

Research Assistant; June 2002 - May 2003

Supervisor: Emanuel Donchin, Ph.D.

 

Research Assistant; June 2001 - May 2002

Supervisor: Cynthia Cimino, Ph.D.

 

CLINICAL EXPERIENCE

NYU Rusk Institute Brain Injury Day Treatment Program; New York, NY

Neuropsychological Rehabilitation Practicum; January 2006 – February 2007 

Supervisors: Yehuda Ben-Yishay, Ph.D., Mark Johnson, Ph.D.

Testing Experience: NYU Orienting Remedial Module (ORM), Cancellation Tests

Clinical Experience: Leading and Co-leading group therapy, Individual therapy

 

Winthrop University Hospital; Mineola, NY

Neuropsychology Assessment Practicum; June2005 - December 2005

Supervisor: Nancy S. Foldi, Ph.D.

Testing Experience: Boston Diagnostic Aphasia Exam (BDAE), Boston—Rochester

Neuropsychological Screening Test (BRNS), California Verbal Learning Test—Second Edition (CVLT—II), Cancellation tests, Clinical Dementia Rating Scale (CDR), Dementia Rating Scale (DRS), Geriatric Depression Scales, Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale—Revised (WAIS-R), Wechsler Memory Scale—Third Edition (WMS-III), Bender Visual Retention Test, Ray—Osterreith Complex Figure

 

Clinical Experience: Clinical interviews, Mini Mental Status Exam

 

JOURNAL PUBLICATIONS

Gates, N., Kayser, J., Tenke, C. E., & Bruder, G. E. (in preparation). Event-related brain potential (ERP) indices and behavioral measures of the emotional Stroop task among healthy adults.

Kayser, J., Tenke, C. E., Kroppmann, C. J., Fekri, S., Alshuler, D. M., Gates, N. A., Gil, R. B., & Bruder, G. E. (in press) Current source density (CSD) old/new effects during recognition memory for words and faces in schizophrenia and in healthy adults. International Journal of Psychophysiology.

Kayser, J., Tenke, C. E., Gates, N. A., & Bruder, G. E. (2007). Reference-independent ERP old/new effects of auditory and visual word recognition memory: joint extraction of stimulus- and response-locked neuronal generator patterns. Psychophysiology, 44 (6), 949-967.

Kayser, J., Tenke, C.E., Gates, N.A., Kroppmann, C.J., Gil, R.B., & Bruder, G.E. (2006). ERP/CSD Indices of impaired verbal working memory subprocesses in schizophrenia. Psychophysiology, 43(3), 237-252.

 

PEER-REVIEWED CONFERENCE PUBLICATIONS

Gates, N.A., Tenke, C.E., Alschuler, D.M., Kroppmann, C.J., Bruder, G.E., Kayser, J. (2009). Loudness dependency of mismatch negativity (MMN): Evidence from CSD-PCA. Paper to be presented at the 15th International Congress on Event-related Potentials of the brain (EPIC) in Bloomington, IN, April 22 – 25, 2009. (EPIC 2009)

Gates, N.A., Kayser, J., Tenke, C.E. (2009). Is there emotional interference in a Stroop-like paradigm? Electrophysiologic evidence from temporal PCA applied to current source density (CSD) waveforms. Paper to be presented at the 15th International Congress on Event-related Potentials of the Brain (EPIC) in Bloomington, IN, April 22 – 25, 2009. (EPIC 2009)

Kayser, J., Tenke, C.E., Malaspina, D., Kroppmann, C.J., Gates, N.A., Bruder, G.E. (2009). Electrophysiologic evidence for olfactory dysfunction in schizophrenia: A CSD-PCA study using hydrogen sulfide. Paper to be presented at the 15th International Congress on Event-related Potentials of the Brain (EPIC) in Bloomington, IN, April 22 – 25, 2009. (EPIC 2009)

Tenke, C.E., Kayser, J., Gates, N.A., Alschuler, D.M., Bruder, G.E. (2009). A concise characterization of N1/P2 loudness dependency by temporal principal components analysis of current source density (CSD-PCA). Paper to be presented at the 15th International Congress on Event-related Potentials of the Brain (EPIC) in Bloomington, IN, April 22 – 25, 2009. (EPIC 2009)

Kayser, J., Tenke, C.E., Malaspina, D., Kroppmann, C.J., Schaller, J.D., Deptula, A., Gates, N.A., Gil, R.B., & Bruder, G.E. (2008). Neuronal generator patterns of olfactory event-related potentials (OERP) in schizophrenia. Paper presented at the 5th Joint Conference of the International Society for NeuroImaging in Psychiatry (ISNIP) and the EEG & Clinical Neuroscience Society (ECNS) in Frankfurt/Main, Germany, September 10 – 13, 2008, and the 48th Annual Meeting of the Society for Psychophysiological Research (SPR) in Austin, Texas, USA, October 1-5, 2008.

Tenke, C.E., Kayser, J., Kroppmann, C.J., Gates, N.A., Schaller, J.D., Stewart, J.W., & Bruder, G.E. (2008). Reduced brain potentials to novelty in depression: characterization of neural sources by principal components analysis (PCA) of current source density (CSD) waveforms. Biological Psychiatry, 63, 81S.

Kayser, J., Tenke, C.E., Gates, N.A., & Bruder, G.E. (2008). Auditory and visual word recognition memory (WRM) in schizophrenia: stimulus- and response-locked neuronal generator patterns. Biological Psychiatry, 63, 80S.

Tenke, C.E., Kayser, J., Kroppmann, C.J., Gates, N.A., Schaller, J.D., Stewart, J.W., & Bruder, G.E. (2007). Novelty P3 reductions in depression: characterization using CSD-PCA. Psychophysiology, 44, S109.

Bruder, G.E., Tenke, C.E., Kayser, J., Kroppmann, C.J., Gates, N.A., Schaller, J., & Stewart, J.W. (2007). Reduced event-related brain potentials to novelty in clinical depression. Paper presented at the 4th Joint Meeting of the EEG and Clinical Neuroscience Society (ECNS) and International Society for Neuroimaging in Psychiatry (ISNIP) in Montreal, Canada, September 19-23.

Kayser, J., Tenke, C.E., Gates, N.A., & Bruder, G.E. (2007). Reference-independent ERP old/new effects of auditory and visual word recognition memory: joint extraction of stimulus- and response-locked neuronal generator patterns. Psychophysiology, 44, S97.

Gates, N. A., Kayser, J., & Tenke, C. E. (2006). Looking for emotional interference in a Stroop-like paradigm: behavioral and event-related potential (ERP) finding. Presented at the 3rd Annual Joint Meeting of the EEG and Clinical Neuroscience Society (ECNS) and International Society for Neuroimaging in Psychiatry (ISNIP) in Boston, MA. September 13 -17.

Kayser, J., Tenke, C.E., Griggs, C.B., Gates, N.A., Kroppmann, C.J., Gil, R.B., & Bruder, G.E. (2006). ERP generator patterns in schizophrenia during tonal and phonetic oddball tasks: effects of response hand and silent count. Presented at the 3rd Annual Joint Meeting of the EEG and Clinical Neuroscience Society (ECNS) and International Society for Neuroimaging in Psychiatry (ISNIP) in Boston, MA. September 13 -17.

Kayser, J., Tenke, C. E., Gates, N. A., Kroppman, C. J., Sedoruk, J. P., Griggs, C. B., Stewart, J. W., Quitkin, F. M., & Bruder, G. E. (2005, September).  Identifying generators of visual recognition memory (Old/New) effects in affective disorders: A principal component analysis (PCA) of Laplacian waveforms. Poster presented at the 45th annual meeting of theSociety of Psychophysiological Research (SPR).

Kayser, J., Tenke, C. E., Gates, N. A., Kroppman, C. J.,Gil, R. B., & Bruder, G. E. (2005, May). Verbal working memory (WM) in schizophrenia: Event-relatedbrain potential (ERP) findings for the Word Serial Position test. Poster presented at the 60th annual meeting of the Society of Biological Psychiatry (SoBP).

Siders, C. A., Cimino, C. R., & Gates, N. (2003, February). Trait depression in the perception and memory of laterally presented emotional words. Paper accepted for presentation at the 31st annual meeting of the International Neuropsychological Society.

 

TECHNICAL SKILLS

Programming languages: DOS Batch, SPSS, Borland Pascal, Matlab, Presentation Control

      Language (PCL); TCL

Stimulus Delivery Software: Neurobehavioral Systems Presentation; Neurscan STIM; PsyScope

Web Programming and Design: HTML, PHP, Flash, Dreamweaver