I am a postdoctoral fellow at Stanford's Brain Development and Education Lab. My research at Stanford focuses on investigating the visual aspects of reading and dyslexia. I developed two broad approaches i) Lab-based, Cross-Sectional, one-time Studies to understand the visual mechanisms that relate to reading abilities and ii) Field-based, Population-level, longitudinal Studies to extend those related measures to a developmentally younger population to understand developmental trajectories. Since some sensory abilities developmentally precede higher cognitive abilities, understanding the developmental trajectories of the visual mechanisms offers the potential for early screening and intervention tools. My work is interdisciplinary, utilizing eye-tracking, psychophysics, electrophysiological and behavioral assessments to explore the relationship between visual function and cognitive outcomes, in neuro-typical and atypical populations and my research vision is to understand the developmental intersection of visual processing mechanisms and neuro-cognitive abilities. 

I hold a Ph.D. in Developmental and Brain Sciences from the University of Massachusetts, Boston, and an MSc in Vision Science from the University of Waterloo, Canada. My research is driven by a passion for translational science, with a focus on understanding the mechanistic underpinnings of typical and atypical development. I aim to leverage this knowledge to improve both screening and intervention methods. My vision is to create a framework where lab-based findings are transformed into experiments, games, or diagnostic tools that can be reliably administered to large and diverse developmental populations. This approach would not only deepen our understanding of the developmental trajectories of sensory and cognitive mechanisms but also offer valuable insights into differences across neurodiverse populations. 

I believe that developing reliable measures and studying effects in broad, representative populations is key to advancing our understanding of these processes. It also has the potential to bridge gaps in health and educational disparities by providing more inclusive and accurate methods for assessing developmental progress and identifying intervention strategies.

https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=IIQxMHMAAAAJ&hl=en

https://www.linkedin.com/in/mahalakshmi-ramamurthy-5198ab2a/