ITU researcher receives grant from The Lundbeck Foundation Investigator Network

Stella Grasshof, Assistant Professor at Computer Science Department at ITU, and her research partner at Region Hovedstaden, has secured a grant of 150.000 Danish kroner from The Lundbeck Foundation Investigator Network to their research project “Automated Analysis of Mental Disorders”.

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Written 1 June, 2023 06:49

Stella Grasshof and her research partner at Region Hovedstaden have secured a grant of 150.000 Danish kroner from The Lundbeck Foundation Investigator Network to finance their research project. The Lundbeck Foundation Investigator Network is a new initiative to strengthen Danish neuroscience by connecting people and disciplines. The main purpose is to develop new areas of multidisciplinary neuroscience research in Denmark to help young researchers realize their scientific potential. 

Stella Grasshof and her research partner at Region Hovedstaden are working on the project ‘Automated Analysis of Mental Disorders’ where they investigate how to detect early signs of mental disorders via patients’ facial expressions.

“We plan to investigate the facial expressions of patients at ultra-high risk of developing mental illness. Over time, we will specifically explore facial action units, which are the smallest units of facial motion, for instance raising the left eyebrow. Expectantly, we will be able to distinguish a healthy control group from a group that shows early signs of mental disorders,” says Stella Grasshof, who further says that “we hope to discover subgroups in the ultra-high-risk paradigm, and if we are successful in our endeavors, our findings can be used directly in the clinical setting by providing guidelines for the diagnosis of different subgroups of the same mental disorder.” 

According to Stella Grasshof, this project has many positive outcomes that both patients, peers and the healthcare system can benefit from. “With this project we hope to contribute to more knowledge of mental disorders and how to detect the early signs of mental illness which can lead to earlier initiated treatment,” says Stella Grasshof who highlights that the grant from The Lundbeck Foundation Investigator Network makes it possible to invest in a new server, that both provides the capacity to use bigger and more complex models and makes it easier for other scholars to use their results.

Further information

Ditte Ørsted Johansen, Press Officer, phone +45 25 55 04 47, email ditj@itu.dk