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Studying semantic processing during language comprehension in humans at the single-cellular level

Award Number: R01DC019653
ORGANIZATION: NATIONAL INSTITUTE ON DEAFNESS AND OTHER COMMUNICATION DISORDERS
OPDIV: NIH
AWARD CLASS: DISCRETIONARY
AWARD ACTIVITY TYPE: SCIENTIFIC/HEALTH RESEARCH (INCLUDES SURVEYS)
PERIOD OF PERFORMANCE START DATE: 03/15/2022
PERIOD OF PERFORMANCE END DATE: 02/28/2027

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Studying semantic processing during language comprehension in humans at the single-cellular level - Studying semantic processing during language comprehension in humans at the single-cellular level Humans are capable of communicating extraordinarily rich and nuanced meanings through language. This capacity surpasses that of all other animal species. Yet, despite a growing understanding of the network of brain areas that supports semantic processing, the precise derivation of linguistic meaning in neural tissue at the cellular-level and over the temporal scales of action potentials remains largely unknown. Over the past several years, our collaborative group has developed unique approaches that have allowed us to record from individual neurons in the language-dominant prefrontal and temporal cortex in participants performing structured linguistic tasks. Here, we will use this extraordinarily rare opportunity together with our group’s unique combined expertise in linguistic theory, human intraoperative neurophysiology, single-neuronal recordings and computational modeling in order to study in detail, for the first time, how semantic information is encoded at a cellular-level during speech and the degree to which single neurons respond selectivity to specific semantic domains, whether semantic information can be robustly decoded from neural activity, the extent to which it can be generalized across linguistic materials and the process by which these neuronal activities maps onto the fine-grained semantic relationships between individual words. Using structured linguistic manipulations and violations and by employing information-theoretic techniques, we will also crucially examine whether certain neurons in humans respond selectively to linguistic compared to non-linguistic information, how they engaged in lexico-semantic or syntactic processes, how they track the real-time context-dependent inferred meanings of individual words during speech and how these mixed representations and computations are distributed within frontal and temporal cortical populations in the language-dominant hemisphere. Taken together, this novel cross-institutional, inter-disciplinary collaborative effort promises to provide a fundamental new platform by which to begin studying the basic cellular mechanisms that underlie human language and unprecedented new insight into the cellular-level processing and representation of linguistic meaning during language comprehension in humans.


Issue Date FY	Funding FY	Legal Entity Name	Legal Entity Address	Legal Entity City	Legal Entity State	Legal Entity Zip Code	Legal Entity COUNTY	Legal Entity COUNTRY	Assistance Listing	Award Code	Budget Year	Action Date	Action Type	Action Amount

Issue Date FY: 2026 ( Subtotal = $531,720 )
2026	2026	THE GENERAL HOSPITAL CORPORATION	55 FRUIT ST	BOSTON	MA	02114	SUFFOLK	USA	Research Related to Deafness and Communication Disorders	000	5	3/4/2026	NON-COMPETING CONTINUATION	$531,720
														Subtotal = $531,720

Issue Date FY: 2025 ( Subtotal = $531,720 )
2025	2025	THE GENERAL HOSPITAL CORPORATION	55 FRUIT ST	BOSTON	MA	02114	SUFFOLK	USA	Research Related to Deafness and Communication Disorders	000	4	1/28/2025	NON-COMPETING CONTINUATION	$478,548
2025	2025	THE GENERAL HOSPITAL CORPORATION	55 FRUIT ST	BOSTON	MA	02114	SUFFOLK	USA	Research Related to Deafness and Communication Disorders	001	4	5/20/2025	NON-COMPETING CONTINUATION	$53,172
														Subtotal = $531,720

Issue Date FY: 2024 ( Subtotal = $531,720 )
2024	2024	THE GENERAL HOSPITAL CORPORATION	55 FRUIT ST	BOSTON	MA	02114	SUFFOLK	USA	Research Related to Deafness and Communication Disorders	000	3	2/7/2024	NON-COMPETING CONTINUATION	$478,548
2024	2024	THE GENERAL HOSPITAL CORPORATION	55 FRUIT ST	BOSTON	MA	02114	SUFFOLK	USA	Research Related to Deafness and Communication Disorders	001	3	5/2/2024	NON-COMPETING CONTINUATION	$53,172
														Subtotal = $531,720

Issue Date FY: 2023 ( Subtotal = $548,856 )
2023	2023	THE GENERAL HOSPITAL CORPORATION	55 FRUIT ST	BOSTON	MA	02114	SUFFOLK	USA	Research Related to Deafness and Communication Disorders	000	2	2/13/2023	NON-COMPETING CONTINUATION	$548,856
														Subtotal = $548,856

Issue Date FY: 2022 ( Subtotal = $548,856 )
2022	2022	MASSACHUSETTS GENERAL HOSPITAL, THE	55 FRUIT ST	BOSTON	MA	02114	SUFFOLK	USA	Research Related to Deafness and Communication Disorders	000	1	3/14/2022	NEW	$548,856
														Subtotal = $548,856

Grand Total All Awards = $2,692,872

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Studying semantic processing during language comprehension in humans at the single-cellular level

Award Number: R01DC019653

ORGANIZATION: NATIONAL INSTITUTE ON DEAFNESS AND OTHER COMMUNICATION DISORDERS

OPDIV: NIH

AWARD CLASS: DISCRETIONARY

AWARD ACTIVITY TYPE: SCIENTIFIC/HEALTH RESEARCH (INCLUDES SURVEYS)

PERIOD OF PERFORMANCE START DATE: 03/15/2022

PERIOD OF PERFORMANCE END DATE: 02/28/2027

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