Where is NW Noggin?
Our innovative graduate and undergraduate art and neuroscience volunteers are Regional Arts & Culture Council (RACC) Juice award-winning developing experts in science communication, synapsing for science, and teaching in schools, theaters, museums, urban and rural communities, homeless youth centers, breweries, correctional facilities, Congress and bike shop pubs! For more information see NOGGIN BLOGGIN.NW Noggin is a locally sourced, 501(c)(3) ALL-VOLUNTEER shoestring nonprofit organization. Your tax-deductible contribution supports the purchase of sheep brains, pipe cleaners, electrodes and clay for innovative, arts-integrated outreach, and helps send volunteers from local universities (including Portland State University, OHSU, and other area institutions) to public school classrooms, conferences and free community events.
DONATE HERE!
LEARN MORE: Community Neuroscience: How to Build an Outreach Organization
NW Noggin: Art + Brains
Tired Trappers at Fort
Carry on my wayward son
Join us in Chile in 2025!
Please join us SUMMER 2025 in Valparaíso, Chile - the home of the Humboldt squid! 🦑⚡️🧠🎨😃 We'll explore how neurons carry information, and how research in Chile (involving the squid’s giant fused axons) led to our understanding of the electrical signaling that links our experiences to the world. We’ll visit laboratories to examine the rich history and exciting present of research at the Universidad de Chile en Valparaíso, make art (including arpilleras, woven depictions of experience that help people express challenging memories and preserve them for accountability), and contribute to community engagement through Ciencia al Tiro, a local STEAM (STEM + Arts) outreach nonprofit. We may even create a public mural celebrating famed neurology patient Phineas Gage, who lived for several years after his infamous accident - and drove a stagecoach - in the city of Valpo!
LEARN MORE: LAS NEURONAS SON BACANES. APPLY HERE (PSU): Valparaiso - Arte y Cerebros en Chile APPLY HERE (NON-PSU): ARTS AND BRAINS IN CHILE
Building Brains @ McCoy: Day Three
Our third visit to one of our favorite classrooms, in a converted house on NE MLK… Our dedicated neuro-educator crew from WSU Vancouver and Portland State returned to school on Monday, to talk about synapses, neurotransmitters and drugs… Sarah Loftus from PSU took the lead, using a worksheet she’d designed to introduce…
The Rake’s Brain @ PAM!
We enjoyed an artistic science-packed educational evening in the creative surroundings of the Portland Art Museum on Thursday night, as featured speakers for a “Remixing the Museum: STEAM and New Media” event… We were guests of Hana Layson, the School and Teacher Programs Specialist, Kristin Bayans, the Interpretive Media Specialist, and Phillippa Pitts, a…
Neurophilosophy @ the Newmark
Once again, thanks to the generosity of the OHSU Brain Institute, we brought our busy outreach volunteers to an extraordinary lecture by Patricia Churchland at the Newmark Theater in downtown Portland this week… We staffed another NW Noggin table, and had great fun introducing theater-goers to the creative joys of building pipe cleaner…
Giant neurons @ McCoy: Day Two
Sarah Neveux from WSU Vancouver Neuroscience took the teaching lead this morning, and focused on the neuron, that key cellular component of the complex networks that make up our remarkable nervous systems… We began by reviewing the cortical lobes, and then delved into a discussion of how the 200 billion or…
Healthy Noggins @ Jeff
Our energetic Noggin crew joined Mark Rutledge-Gorman from the Portland Alcohol Research Center (PARC) and a host of other presenters at Jefferson High School in Portland this week, for a Health Fair in the cafeteria… Allie Clark and Rosalie Lee from Portland State University, Angela Gonzalez from WSU Vancouver, and Alfredo Zuniga…
Gray matter @ McCoy
Today we met fifteen sharp high school students at McCoy Academy, a school in Northeast Portland that serves students who have left Portland Public Schools, for (according to teacher Kim Keyes) more structure and smaller class sizes… A group of NW Noggin undergraduates, including Rosalie Lee, Alex Voigt (pictured above)…
A Zombie Feast: Imaging Brains @ Velo!
Sam Carpenter, from the Fair Neuroimaging Lab at OHSU, along with Kathryn McAnalley from PNCA, artfully informed and entertained a crowd of bike, brain and beer aficionados in Northeast Portland on a sunny Thursday night… They talked of images, and brains, and how what we know and can learn about the relationship between…
Cougars and Tigers and Brains!
NW Noggin volunteers from WSU Vancouver headed north to Battle Ground High School, home of the Tigers, to talk about brains with 75 or so students who had spent their morning dissecting fetal pigs..! Neuroscience and Psychology students Bradley Mahoney, Chelsey Taylor Anderson, and Jayme Anderson, along with Bill and Jeff, went…
Revealing Curves @ Velo April 30th!
Revealing curves: Imaging the human brain Pictures of the brain in action are everywhere these days, but what do these fMRI images really represent? How are they acquired, and what do they tell us about how the brain works? Sam Carpenter from the Fair lab at OHSU, and Kathryn McAnalley…
A Skyview Brain-Storm!
A healthy crowd of committed undergraduate volunteers gathered early this morning at Skyview High, home of the Storm, for our fourth and final day in Biology classrooms… We are going to miss our students, whom we’ve gotten to know over the past month, through our ongoing series of Thursday visits. Art activities, short introductory lectures, and direct,…
Synapsing in San Diego
“I’ve learned that you shouldn’t go through life with a catcher’s mitt on both hands. You need to be able to throw something back.” ―Maya Angelou.
Our AMAZING volunteers organized the largest all ages Art & Neuroscience Festival in the Pacific Northwest! We offered live bands, science-inspired art, neuroscience research presentations, and the chance to ask questions and examine real brains! The fifth annual Noggin Fest helped send more young scientists and artists to the Society for Neuroscience conference in San Diego - and into San Diego Unified Public Schools! LEARN MORE @ Brains Beyond SfN!.