Liza van Eijk

Dr Liza van Eijk has a strong interest in neuroimaging and neuropsychology. She is in particular interested in identifying biomarkers to improve patient’s lives, whether that is by assisting with earlier diagnosis, personalizing treatment, or distinguishing between subtypes of disease.

Dr van Eijk is the CIA on a pilot study examining the implementation and clinical utility of quantified neonatal brain MRI at term-equivalent age at Townsville University and Cairns Hospital for infants at high risk of adverse neurodevelopmental outcomes, funded by the TAAHC Seed grant 2021 Aus $50 000. This project is a collaboration between JCU, Townsville University and Cairns Hospital, UQ and the CSIRO. This aligns with one of her research interests focusing on predicting clinical outcomes in preterm-born infants based on measures derived from neonatal MRI, in collaboration with the Australian-eHealth Research Centre, the CSIRO, and the Child health Research Centre, the University of Queensland. Dr van Eijk is also the CIA on a project funded by the JCU Cross Campus grant 2021 Aus $20 000, enabling EEG at Townsville and Singapore campuses. In addition, she collaborates with clinicians and researchers to enable the use of quantitative MRI measures for clinical and research settings in North-Queensland and is involved in several student projects.

Previously, Dr van Eijk examined biological sex differences in the brain, and how these brain sex differences are related to behaviour and disorders that have shown sex differences, such as Autism Spectrum Disorder. She has published first-author papers in high-quality journals such as Neuroimaging (Q1, IF=5.8) and Psychological science (Q1, IF=4.9), and has presented her work at both international (e.g. Meeting of the Organization for Human Brain Mapping) and national conferences (e.g. Australasian Academy of Cerebral Palsy and Developmental Medicine, Australasian Cognitive Neuroscience Society meeting).

Dr van Eijk is a subject coordinator and lecturer for third-year Psychology subject PY3109 ‘Cognitive Neuroscience: The Biology of Mind’, and previously, second-year Psychology subject PY2101 ‘Psychological Neuroscience’. She has a visiting researcher affiliation with the Australian e-Health Research Centre, at the CSIRO.

She welcomes applications from students who are looking for a supervisor for a research project related to neuroimaging, neuroscience and/or neuropsychology.