AICONS Lab

Lab News

Awards, grants, publications, and milestones from our team, celebrating the achievements that drive our science forward.

Year
2026
Sep 2026
Award
Queen Elizabeth II Graduate Scholarship: Brendan Wood

Congrats Brendan on receiving the Queen Elizabeth II/Sunnybrook and Women’s College Health Sciences Centre Graduate Scholarship in Science and Technology!

Sep 2026
Conference
Oral Presentation at iCAA 2026: Chloe Jacquet

Chloe gave an oral presentation at the iCAA conference in Banff (September 2026), showing that MRI-derived neuroinflammation is associated with co-morbid Alzheimer’s disease and cerebral amyloid angiopathy (CAA) pathology. Congrats Chloe!

Sep 2026
Conference
Poster Presentation at ECCV 2026: Tony Xu

Tony presented his poster at the European Conference on Computer Vision (ECCV) 2026 in Malmö, exploring how self-supervised learning can be harnessed for segmentation in 3D microscopy with noisy labels and hard patches. Congrats Tony!

May 2026
Award
T-CAIREM Summer Scholarship: Kashaf Masood

Congrats Kashaf on receiving the T-CAIREM Summer Scholarship! She will be working on developing personalized AI models to predict brain effective connectivity in Alzheimer’s disease resilience.

2025
Nov 2025
Milestone
PhD Defence: Dr. Ahmadreza Attarpour

Congratulations Dr. Ahmadreza Attarpour on successfully defending his PhD! Ahmadreza’s doctoral work developed deep learning pipelines for 3D brain-wide mapping of local neuronal ensembles in teravoxel light-sheet microscopy, including whole-brain connectome profiling at single-axon resolution. We are so proud of you, Dr. Attarpour!

Oct 2025
Conference
Poster Presentation at ICCV 2025: Tony Xu

Tony presented his poster at the International Conference on Computer Vision (ICCV) 2025 in Honolulu, introducing ModalTune, a method for fine-tuning slide-level foundation models with multi-modal information for multi-task learning in digital pathology. Congrats Tony!

Sep 2025
Award
Medical Biophysics Excellence Award: Brendan Wood

Congrats Brendan on receiving the Medical Biophysics Excellence Award!

Sep 2025
Award
Ontario Graduate Scholarship: Brendan Wood

Congrats Brendan on receiving the Ontario Graduate Scholarship (OGS)!

Sep 2025
Conference
SELMA3D 2025 Challenge (MICCAI 2025): Tony Xu

Tony participated in the SELMA3D 2025 challenge at MICCAI 2025, continuing his work on self-supervised learning for 3D light-sheet microscopy image segmentation. Congrats Tony!

Sep 2025
Conference
FLARE 2025 Challenge (MICCAI 2025): Tony Xu

Tony participated in the FLARE 2025 challenge at MICCAI 2025, presenting his work on self-distillation representation learning and parameter-efficient fine-tuning for pretrained models in multimodal 3D medical imaging. Congrats Tony!

Jul 2025
Conference
Poster Presentation at AAIC 2025: Katrina Carver

Katrina presented her poster at the Alzheimer’s Association International Conference (AAIC) 2025 in Toronto, identifying multimodal amyloid, tau, and neurodegeneration (ATN) subtypes in Alzheimer’s disease across datasets and imaging markers. Congrats Katrina!

Jul 2025
Conference
Poster Presentation at Japan Neuroscience Society 2025: Jazlynn Tan

Jazlynn presented her poster at the Japan Neuroscience Society 2025 annual meeting, investigating how hyperexcitability and aberrant connectivity underlie attention deficits following traumatic brain injury. Congrats Jazlynn!

Jul 2025
Conference
Poster Presentation at BRAIN & BRAIN PET 2025: Jazlynn Tan

Jazlynn presented her poster at BRAIN & BRAIN PET 2025, showing that persistent dysfunctional connectivity between visual and memory brain networks underlies attention deficits following traumatic brain injury. Congrats Jazlynn!

Mar 2025
Conference
IGT x ImNO Joint Symposium 2025: Ahmadreza Attarpour

Ahmadreza presented his work at the IGT x ImNO Joint Symposium in Toronto (March 2025), showcasing a deep learning pipeline for 3D brain-wide mapping of local neuronal ensembles. Congrats Ahmadreza!

Jan 2025
Conference
Poster Presentation at HAI 2025: Dr. Peter Kang

Dr. Peter Kang presented his poster at HAI 2025 in San Juan, Puerto Rico, using graph convolutional networks to predict cognitive decline at the individual level in Alzheimer’s disease. Congrats Peter!

Jan 2025
Conference
Poster Presentation at HAI 2025: Dr. Julie Ottoy

Dr. Ottoy presented her poster at the Human Amyloid Imaging (HAI) 2025 conference in San Juan, Puerto Rico, uncovering distinct spatiotemporal patterns of vascular disease across Alzheimer’s disease subtypes. Congrats Julie!

2024
Nov 2024
Award
Google PhD Fellowship: Tony Xu

Congratulations Tony on being awarded the 2024 Google PhD Fellowship! This highly competitive recognition will support his innovative research in self-supervised learning, empowering him to address key challenges in analysing large and multidimensional medical images.

Oct 2024
Conference
SELMA3D Challenge (MICCAI 2024): Tony Xu

Tony participated in the SELMA3D challenge at MICCAI 2024, tackling self-supervised learning for 3D light-sheet microscopy image segmentation. Congrats Tony!

Oct 2024
Conference
Poster Presentation at SfN: Ahmadreza Attarpour

Ahmadreza presented his poster at the 2024 Society for Neuroscience (SfN) conference in Chicago, US, showcasing an end-to-end deep learning pipeline for 3D mapping of laminar neuronal activity in light sheet data. Congrats Ahmadreza!

Oct 2024
Award
Medical Biophysics Excellence Award: Katrina Carver

Congrats Katrina on receiving the Medical Biophysics Excellence Award!

Sep 2024
Grant
Alzheimer's Association Research Fellowship: Dr. Julie Ottoy

Dr. Ottoy has been awarded the prestigious 2024 Alzheimer’s Association Research Fellowship (AARF). This funding will support her groundbreaking study on the dynamic interplay between vascular injury and inflammation in the progression of Alzheimer’s disease. Learn more →

Sep 2024
Award
NSERC Postgraduate Scholarship-Doctoral (PGS D): Tony Xu

Congrats Tony on receiving the NSERC PGS-D award!

Aug 2024
Fellowship
BrightFocus Postdoctoral Fellowship: Dr. Julie Ottoy

Congrats to Dr. Julie Ottoy for being awarded a fellowship from BrightFocus. Dr. Ottoy’s project will investigate how brain inflammation and vascular injury play a role in Alzheimer’s disease progression using advanced biomarker studies.

Jul 2024
Keynote
Invited Keynote at Alzheimer's Imaging Consortium 2024: Dr. Julie Ottoy

Dr. Ottoy delivered an invited keynote at the Alzheimer’s Imaging Consortium (AIC) in Philadelphia (July 27), speaking on the current state of neuroimaging in Alzheimer’s disease and related disorders. Congrats Julie!

Jul 2024
Award
VAST Graduate Student Scholarship: Matthew Rozak

Congratulations Matt for winning the VAST Graduate Student Award! His research explores how Traumatic Brain Injury impacts sensory processing and memory by examining cerebrovascular dysfunction using advanced imaging and deep learning.

Jun 2024
Conference
Poster Presentations at OHBM & AAIC 2024: Dr. Julie Ottoy

Dr. Ottoy presented her work at OHBM in Seoul (June) and AAIC in Philadelphia (July), examining how white matter inflammation relates to core Alzheimer’s disease pathophysiological processes. Congrats Julie!

Jun 2024
Conference
Poster Presentation at OHBM 2024: Jazlynn Tan

Jazlynn presented her poster at the Organization for Human Brain Mapping (OHBM) 2024 conference in Seoul, South Korea, investigating stepwise connectivity patterns along the gradients of brain organization in Alzheimer’s disease. Congrats Jazlynn!

May 2024
Conference
Oral Presentation at VAST 2024: Dr. Julie Ottoy

Dr. Ottoy gave an oral presentation at the Vascular Training Platform (VAST) conference in Banff, Canada (May 30), showing that free water levels in normal-appearing white matter can predict vascular lesion progression in individuals with dementia. Congrats Julie!

May 2024
Conference
Talk at CNSF Congress 2024: Lyndon Boone

Lyndon presented his talk at the Canadian Neurological Sciences Federation (CNSF) Congress in Toronto (May 26), exploring optimal targeting in MR-guided focused ultrasound capsulotomy for treatment-resistant OCD and MDD using probabilistic lesion mapping. Congrats Lyndon!

Apr 2024
Conference
Poster Presentation at AAN 2024: Amin Banihashemi

Amin presented his poster at the American Academy of Neurology annual meeting in Denver, CO (Apr 13–18), looking at how hippocampal and regional brain volumes relate to retinal OCT imaging across the aging–MCI–AD continuum. Congrats Amin!

Mar 2024
Award
Wu Tsai Neuroscience Institute Visiting Scholar: Dr. Maged Goubran

Congrats Dr. Goubran on receiving the Wu Tsai Neuroscience Institute Visiting Scholar Award from Stanford! He hosted the MIRACL workshop and gave a talk at the Radiological Sciences Lab Seminar at the Department of Radiology.

Feb 2024
Grant
NIH R01 Grant

Dr. Goubran, in collaboration with Drs. Stefanovic (UofT), McLaurin (UofT), and Hyder (Yale), have been awarded the NIH R01 grant for “Imaging the effects of transcranial alternating current stimulation in an experimental model of Alzheimer’s Disease.” This research explores how tACS influences neuronal oscillations and working memory in AD models.

Jan 2024
Conference
Poster Presentation at Human Amyloid Imaging 2024: Dr. Julie Ottoy

Dr. Ottoy presented her poster at HAI 2024 in Miami (Jan 17), showing how tau propagates along the principal axes of functional and structural brain organization in Alzheimer’s disease. Congrats Julie!

Jan 2024
Conference
Poster Presentation at Human Amyloid Imaging 2024: Dr. Peter Kang

Dr. Peter Kang presented his work at HAI 2024 in Miami (Jan 17–19), exploring how regional cell-type proportions relate to AD pathological changes. Congrats Peter!

2023
Sep 2023
Conference
Oral Presentation at SfN: Ahmadreza Attarpour

Ahmadreza will present at the 2023 Society for Neuroscience (SfN) conference in Washington, DC. Congrats!

Jul 2023
Grant
CIHR Spring 2023 Project Grant

Congratulations to Dr. Maged Goubran, co-investigators Dr. Jennifer Rabin, Dr. Julie Ottoy, and Dr. Peter Kang, on receiving the CIHR Spring 2023 Project Grant. The project will use advanced brain imaging and AI to unravel the relationship between brain connectivity, tau spread, and cognitive decline in Alzheimer’s disease.

Jun 2023
Publication
Paper Featured on Cover of JCBFM

Our lab’s paper was featured on the cover of the Journal of Cerebral Blood Flow & Metabolism. The paper investigates how diffusion MRI-based microstructural alterations contribute to amyloid PET and cognition in white matter regions.

May 2023
Award
T-CAIREM AI in Medicine Summer Studentship: Lyndon Boone & Grace Yu

Congrats Lyndon and Grace on receiving the T-CAIREM 2023 summer studentship!

May 2023
Award
CIHR Fellowship & ASRP Postdoctoral Grant: Dr. Peter Kang

Congrats Peter on receiving the CIHR fellowship and ASRP Postdoctoral Award!

Apr 2023
Conference
Oral Presentation at AAIC: Dr. Julie Ottoy

Julie’s work will be presented at the Alzheimer’s Association International Conference. Congrats!

Apr 2023
Award
NSERC CGS-M Award: Katrina Carver

Congrats Katrina on receiving the NSERC CGS-M award!

Jan 2023
Conference
Oral Presentations at Human Amyloid Imaging Conference: Dr. Julie Ottoy & Peter Kang

Julie and Peter presented at the 2023 Human Amyloid Imaging Conference in Miami, FL. Congrats!

2022
Nov 2022
Award
Canada Research Chair: Dr. Maged Goubran

Congrats Maged for being named a Canada Research Chair (Tier 2) in Artificial Intelligence and Computational Neuroscience!

Sep 2022
Award
VAST Graduate Scholarships: Ahmadreza Attarpour & Matthew Rozak

Congrats Ahmadreza and Matt for receiving Vascular Training (VAST) graduate scholarships!

Aug 2022
Award
National Science Scholarship (PhD): Jazlynn Tan

Congrats Jazlynn on receiving the National Science Scholarship (PhD) from the Agency for Science, Technology and Research (A*STAR), Singapore!

May 2022
Award
CIHR CGS-M Award: Tony Xu

Congrats Tony for receiving the CGS-M award!

May 2022
Grant
ASRP New Investigator Grant: Dr. Maged Goubran

Congrats Maged for receiving a new investigator grant from the Alzheimer Society Research Program!

May 2022
Award
OHBM Merit Award: Dr. Julie Ottoy

Congrats Julie for receiving a merit award for an exceptional abstract submitted to the OHBM conference 2022!

Mar 2022
Conference
Oral Presentations at OHBM & AD/PD: Dr. Julie Ottoy

Julie’s work will be presented at OHBM and AD/PD international conferences. Congrats!

Mar 2022
Award
MBP International PhD Award: Ahmadreza Attarpour

Congrats Ahmadreza for receiving an MBP international PhD award!

2021
Oct 2021
Fellowship
Alzheimer Association Fellowship: Dr. Julie Ottoy

Congrats Julie for receiving the Alzheimer Association Fellowship!

Sep 2021
Award
CIHR PhD Award: Amin Banihashemi

Congrats to Amin for receiving a CIHR PhD award!

Sep 2021
Award
OGS Awards: Matthew Rozak & Lyndon Boone

Congrats Matt and Lyndon for receiving OGS awards!

Jun 2021
Grant
CIHR Project Grant

CIHR project grant with Drs. Bojana Stefanovic and JoAnne McLaurin funded!

Mar 2021
Award
NSERC MSc Award: Lyndon Boone

Congrats to Lyndon for receiving a NSERC MSc award!

Mar 2021
Grant
NSERC Discovery Grant

NSERC discovery grant funded!

Jan 2021
Award
Vision Science Research Scholarship: Amin Banihashemi

Congrats Amin for receiving the Vision Science Research Scholarship!

2020
Dec 2020
Publication
Top 10% Most Downloaded Paper: Human Brain Mapping

Our publication was among the top 10% most downloaded papers in Human Brain Mapping in 2020. Congrats!

Sep 2020
Award
Donald Stuss Young Investigator Innovation Award: Dr. Maged Goubran

Congrats Maged for receiving the Donald Stuss Young Investigator innovation award!

Mar 2020
Publication
Paper Featured by Nature Communications Editors

Our publication was featured by editors of Nature Communications. Congrats!

Feb 2020
Award
Heffernan New Investigator Award: Dr. Maged Goubran

Congrats Maged for receiving the Heffernan New Investigator Award!