Dan Benjamini, Ph.D.

Dr. Benjamini’s research combines strengths in computer science and mathematics with radiology and neuroscience. He aims to elucidate the relationships between microstructure, chemical composition and function in neuronal tissue, with a focus on neurodegeneration and neuroinflammation. His program applies a multiscale approach to mitigate MRI’s limited spatial resolution by integrating it with complementary microscopic and noninvasive imaging modalities in a multidimensional manner. Doing so enables the development of novel imaging markers based on advanced yet clinically usable MRI methods and biophysical modeling, as well as their validation and translation into clinical applications. This research program makes use of ex vivo, preclinical and clinical MRI, and focuses on quantifying neuropathologic processes that occur in normative aging, mild cognitive impairment, and dementia at the tissue, cellular, and subcellular levels.

After finishing his undergraduate and Master’s degrees in Biomedical Engineering in Israel’s Tel Aviv University, Dan Benjamini moved to the USA in 2012, where through an NIH graduate partnership program he completed his Ph.D. in the lab of Peter Basser in 2015. He was a Postdoctoral Visiting Fellow with Peter Basser at the NICHD from 2015 to 2018. During his tenure he won the Giulio Cesare Borgia Prize for Young Researchers at the 2016 International Conference on Magnetic Resonance in Porous Media for his work on accelerating multidimensional MRI acquisition. Dr. Benjamini went on to serve as a Staff Scientist at the Neuroradiology–Neuropathology Integration Core of the Center for Neuroscience and Regenerative Medicine from 2018 to 2021. In 2021, Dr. Benjamini received the Stadtman Investigator Award at NIH and joined NIA's Laboratory of Behavioral Neuroscience as a Tenure-Track Investigator. He is currently serving as a Principal Investigator and the Chief of the Multiscale Imaging and Integrative Biophysics (MiiB) Unit.