Digital Health Seminar Series: Niall Bourke

Niall Bourke (King's College London)

Ultra-low field Neuroimaging in the Young (UNITY): A growing network investigating factors relating to brain development in low-resource settings

MRI remains inaccessible in many parts of the world, as do the computational resources needed to perform neuroimaging analysis. Our goal is to develop scalable tools that improve access to neuroimaging in low-resource settings and support a growing research community. 

We are partnered with Hyperfine, Flywheel, and numerous collaborators across sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia to collect and process MRI scans from children in the first years of life. 

Using containerised workflows optimised for ultra-low field paediatric imaging, we process data from geographically dispersed sites to generate derived volumetric measures. These outputs enable global health analyses as well as locally relevant investigations into factors influencing neurodevelopment, including maternal anaemia, HIV exposure, and malnutrition.

Speaker bio:

Niall is a research fellow at the Centre for Neuroimaging Sciences, King’s College London, focused on paediatric brain development and outcomes following brain injury. Funded by the Gates Foundation, his current work supports a global network of clinician researchers across Africa and South Asia, building sustainable neuroimaging capacity in low-resource settings. 

Niall leads data harmonisation and processing using Flywheel, a cloud-based imaging platform, where he develops automated containerised workflows (‘Gears’) to streamline neuroimaging analysis. These efforts aim to generate high-quality derived data to support neuromodelling and global child health research, in collaboration with researchers at the WHO and IHME. 

Alongside his academic work, Niall also consults on medicolegal cases, translating complex neuroimaging findings into clinically meaningful interpretations for use in legal and medical contexts. He holds a PhD on social cognition following traumatic brain injury and has held prior research roles in translational neuroscience at Imperial College and neurodevelopmental studies at King’s.

Please note: this seminar will be recorded and shared on YouTube.