Welcome

Welcome to the BNCD Center directed by Mabel L. Rice at the University of Kansas. The BNCD is funded by the National Institute on Deafness and Other Communication Disorders (P30-DC005803). BNCD is affiliated with the Schiefelbusch Institute for Life Span Studies. Currently, 13 BNCD researchers are addressing the causes and treatment of communication disorders across the life span from infancy to old age.

Guide to BNCD Services

Core services are:

• ATT - Analytic Techniques and Technology Core
• DEEC - Digital Electronics and Engineering Core
• PARC - Participant Recruitment and Management Core

Who can use BNCD services?

University of Kansas researchers with externally-funded projects related to the mission of BNCD. Preference is given to NIH-funded projects. To be invited to join the Center, submit a brief formal request to Director Mabel Rice, bncd@ku.edu. All projects are approved for affiliation based on scientific merit and relevance to the BNCD mission.

Where are services located?

Researchers are located at both the Lawrence and the Medical Center campuses of the University of Kansas. The BNCD administrative office is in suite 3031 of the Dole Human Development Center on Sunnyside Avenue in Lawrence, Kansas.

What are the benefits of affiliation with the Center?

The Center fosters productivity and collaboration among a group of leading scientists from a variety of disciplines. Shared resources enlarge the potential impact and the ease of doing research. The Center makes available the expertise of staff members who are skilled in statistics, participant recruitment, and computer engineering.

Research

Dr. Michael Vitevich is applying tools from the branch of mathematics known as graph theory to human memory to understand how words are stored. This approach may explain why many patients recover language skills after brain trauma such as stroke. New research by Dr. Vitevitch [BNCD Investigator], associate professor of psychology and an affiliated scientist with KU’s Life Span Institute, employs tools used by physicists and computer scientists to map the complex system of words in the human brain. Vitevitch’s work, to be published in the April issue of the Journal of Speech-Language-Hearing Research, suggests that when one part of our language network breaks down, the system has the ability to reroute itself.

Read more about BNCD investigator Michael Vitevich's research on language.

News and Announcements

Dr. Mabel Rice has been appointed to the advisory council of the National Institute of Deafness and Other Communication Disorders Institute by U.S. Secretary of Health and Human Services, Michael Leavitt.

Mabel Rice, the Fred and Virginia Merrill Distinguished Professor of Advanced Studies [and BNCD Director], will join a group of 18 appointees that includes 12 leading scientists in the areas of deafness and communication disorders. Her four-year term begins June 1.

The council advises the secretary of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Service, the director of the National Institutes of Health and the director of the NIDCD on matters relating to the conduct and support of research and research training, health information dissemination and other programs with respect to disorders of hearing and other communication processes.

Rice’s research focus has been a disability called specific language impairment. She is conducting a large study of twins with researchers in Australia, England and Nebraska to look for a genetic component of the disorder in tandem with a longitudinal study of non-twin children in Kansas and Missouri.

Rice directs three research centers at KU’s Life Span Institute: the Merrill Center for Advanced Studies, the Biobehavioral Neurosciences in Communication Disorders Center and the Child Language Doctoral Program.