Dr Thomas Shaw
Research Fellow
School of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science
Researcher biography
Dr Thomas B. Shaw is a neuroscientist and MRI researcher at The University of Queensland whose work focuses on developing advanced neuroimaging biomarkers for Motor Neuron Disease (MND) and related neurodegenerative disorders. He leads research at the intersection of ultra-high-field MRI, computational image analysis, and biomedical AI, aiming to identify early markers of disease progression and treatment response.
His research program integrates 7 Tesla and 3 Tesla MRI, magnetic resonance spectroscopy, and quantitative imaging to map brain and spinal cord changes in people living with MND. Dr Shaw helped establish the Asia-Pacific MND Imaging Initiative (AMII), a collaborative network harmonising MRI protocols across major Australian centres including UQ.
He has been successful in competitive research funding, including NHMRC, FightMND, and MND Research Australia grants, and his work appears in e.g., Nature Methods, NeuroImage, and Brain Communications.
His broader interests include metabolic dysfunction, AI-driven diagnostics, and open-science neuroimaging pipelines that enhance reproducibility and collaboration across the neuroscience community.
Journal Articles
Shaw, Thomas B., Ribeiro, Fernanda L., Zhu, Xiangyun, Aiken, Patrick, Bollmann, Saskia, Bollmann, Steffen, Chang, Jeryn, Chidley, Kali, Dempsey-Jones, Harriet, Eftekhari, Zeinab, Gillespie, Jennifer, Henderson, Robert D., Kiernan, Matthew C., Ktena, Ira, McCombe, Pamela A., Ngo, Shyuan T., Taubert, Shana T., Whelan, Brooke-Mai, Ye, Xincheng, Steyn, Frederik J., Tu, Sicong and Barth, Markus (2025). Segmentation of the human tongue musculature using MRI: Field guide and validation in motor neuron disease. Computers in Biology and Medicine, 196 (Part B) 110824, 1-13. doi: 10.1016/j.compbiomed.2025.110824
Ehrhardt, Shane E., Wards, Yohan, Shaw, Thomas B., Garner, Kelly G., Bollmann, Steffen, Mattingley, Jason B., Dux, Paul E. and Filmer, Hannah L. (2025). Generalized learning induced by training and tDCS is predicted by prefrontal cortical morphology. Cerebral Cortex, 35 (8) bhaf229. doi: 10.1093/cercor/bhaf229
Eftekhari, Zeinab, Shaw, Thomas B., Deelchand, Dinesh K., Marjańska, Małgorzata, Bogner, Wolfgang and Barth, Markus (2025). Reliability and Reproducibility of Metabolite Quantification Using 1H MRS in the Human Brain at 3 T and 7 T. NMR in Biomedicine, 38 (8) e70087, e70087-8. doi: 10.1002/nbm.70087
Chang, Jeryn, Teo, Annissa H., Shaw, Thomas B., Dupuis, Luc, Ngo, Shyuan T. and Steyn, Frederik J. (2025). Deciphering hypothalamic pathology in ALS: insights into non-motor symptoms and disease progression. eBioMedicine, 118 105845, 105845-118. doi: 10.1016/j.ebiom.2025.105845
Ribeiro, Fernanda L., Zhu, Xiangyun, Ye, Xincheng, Tu, Sicong, Ngo, Shyuan T., Henderson, Robert D., Steyn, Frederik J., Kiernan, Matthew C., Barth, Markus, Bollmann, Steffen and Shaw, Thomas B. (2025). An annotated multi-site and multi-contrast magnetic resonance imaging dataset for the study of the human tongue musculature. Scientific Data, 12 (1) 790, 790. doi: 10.1038/s41597-025-05092-8
Chang, Jeryn, Lv, JingLei, Guo, Christine C., Lucia, Diana, Bollmann, Saskia, Garner, Kelly, McCombe, Pamela A., Henderson, Robert D., Shaw, Thomas B., Steyn, Frederik J. and Ngo, Shyuan T. (2025). An fMRI dataset for appetite neural correlates in people living with Motor Neuron Disease. Scientific Data, 12 (1) 466, 466. doi: 10.1038/s41597-025-04828-w
Chang, Jeryn, Shaw, Thomas B., McCombe, Pamela A., Henderson, Robert D., Lucia, Diana, Guo, Christine C., Lv, Jinglei, Garner, Kelly, Bollmann, Saskia, Ngo, Shyuan T. and Steyn, Frederik J. (2025). Appetite loss in patients with motor neuron disease: impact on weight loss and neural correlates of visual food cues. Brain Communications, 7 (2) fcaf111, 1-14. doi: 10.1093/braincomms/fcaf111
Flavell, Joshua, Ahern, Emily G. M., Logan, Benignus, Shaw, Thomas B., Adam, Robert J., McElligott, Caitlin A. T. and Nestor, Peter J. (2025). Factors associated with true-positive and false-positive diagnoses of behavioural variant frontotemporal dementia in 100 consecutive referrals from specialist physicians. European Journal of Neurology, 32 (1) e70036, e70036-1. doi: 10.1111/ene.70036
Canada, Kelsey L., Mazloum‐Farzaghi, Negar, Rådman, Gustaf, Adams, Jenna N., Bakker, Arnold, Baumeister, Hannah, Berron, David, Bocchetta, Martina, Carr, Valerie A., Dalton, Marshall A., de Flores, Robin, Keresztes, Attila, La Joie, Renaud, Mueller, Susanne G., Raz, Naftali, Santini, Tales, Shaw, Thomas, Stark, Craig E. L., Tran, Tammy T., Wang, Lei, Wisse, Laura E. M., Wuestefeld, Anika, Yushkevich, Paul A., Olsen, Rosanna K., Daugherty, Ana M. and the Hippocampal Subfields Group (2024). A (sub)field guide to quality control in hippocampal subfield segmentation on high‐resolution T2‐weighted MRI. Human Brain Mapping, 45 (15) e70004, 1-19. doi: 10.1002/hbm.70004
Xu, Marshall, Ribeiro, Fernanda L., Barth, Markus, Bernier, Michaël, Bollmann, Steffen, Chatterjee, Soumick, Cognolato, Francesco, Gulban, Omer F., Itkyal, Vaibhavi, Liu, Siyu, Mattern, Hendrik, Polimeni, Jonathan R., Shaw, Thomas B., Speck, Oliver and Bollmann, Saskia (2024). VesselBoost: a Python toolbox for small blood vessel segmentation in human magnetic resonance angiography data. Aperture Neuro, 4, 1-13. doi: 10.52294/001c.123217
Blackmore, Daniel G., Schaumberg, Mia A., Ziaei, Maryam, Belford, Samuel, To, Xuan Vinh, O’Keeffe, Imogen, Bernard, Anne, Mitchell, Jules, Hume, Emily, Rose, Grace L., Shaw, Thomas, York, Ashley, Barth, Markus, Cooper, Elizabeth J., Skinner, Tina L., Nasrallah, Fatima, Riek, Stephan and Bartlett, Perry F. (2024). Long-term improvement in hippocampal-dependent learning ability in healthy, aged individuals following high intensity interval training. Aging and Disease, 16 (3), 1732-1754. doi: 10.14336/AD.2024.0642
Renton, Angela I., Dao, Thuy T., Johnstone, Tom, Civier, Oren, Sullivan, Ryan P., White, David J., Lyons, Paris, Slade, Benjamin M., Abbott, David F., Amos, Toluwani J., Bollmann, Saskia, Botting, Andy, Campbell, Megan E. J., Chang, Jeryn, Close, Thomas G., Dörig, Monika, Eckstein, Korbinian, Egan, Gary F., Evas, Stefanie, Flandin, Guillaume, Garner, Kelly G., Garrido, Marta I., Ghosh, Satrajit S., Grignard, Martin, Halchenko, Yaroslav O., Hannan, Anthony J., Heinsfeld, Anibal S., Huber, Laurentius, Hughes, Matthew E. ... Bollmann, Steffen (2024). Neurodesk: an accessible, flexible and portable data analysis environment for reproducible neuroimaging. Nature Methods, 21 (2), 804-808. doi: 10.1038/s41592-023-02145-x
Ehrhardt, Shane E., Wards, Yohan, Rideaux, Reuben, Marjańska, Małgorzata, Jin, Jin, Cloos, Martijn A., Deelchand, Dinesh K., Zöllner, Helge J., Saleh, Muhammad G., Hui, Steve C. N., Ali, Tonima, Shaw, Thomas B., Barth, Markus, Mattingley, Jason B., Filmer, Hannah L. and Dux, Paul E. (2024). Neurochemical predictors of generalised learning induced by brain stimulation and training. The Journal of Neuroscience, 44 (21) e1676232024, 1-15. doi: 10.1523/jneurosci.1676-23.2024
Filmer, Hannah L., Loughnan, Kathleen, Seeto, Jennifer X., Ballard, Timothy, Ehrhardt, Shane E., Shaw, Thomas, Wards, Yohan, Rideaux, Reuben, Leow, Li-Ann, Sewell, David and Dux, Paul E. (2023). Individual differences in decision strategy relate to neurochemical excitability and cortical thickness. The Journal of Neuroscience, 43 (42), 7006-7015. doi: 10.1523/jneurosci.1086-23.2023
Schira, Mark M., Isherwood, Zoey J., Kassem, Mustafa S., Barth, Markus, Shaw, Thomas B., Roberts, Michelle M. and Paxinos, George (2023). HumanBrainAtlas: an in vivo MRI dataset for detailed segmentations. Brain Structure and Function, 228 (8), 1-15. doi: 10.1007/s00429-023-02653-8
Chang, Jeryn, Shaw, Thomas B., Holdom, Cory J., McCombe, Pamela A., Henderson, Robert D., Fripp, Jurgen, Barth, Markus, Guo, Christine C., Ngo, Shyuan T. and Steyn, Frederik J. (2022). Lower hypothalamic volume with lower BMI is associated with shorter survival in patients with ALS. European Journal of Neurology, 30 (1), 57-68. doi: 10.1111/ene.15589
Chang, Jeryn, Steyn, Frederik, Ngo, Shyuan, Henderson, Robert, Guo, Christine, Bollmann, Steffen, Fripp, Jurgen, Barth, Markus and Shaw, Thomas (2022). Open-Source Hypothalamic-ForniX (OSHy-X) Atlases and
Segmentation Tool for 3T and 7T. Journal of Open Source Software, 7 (76), 4368. doi: 10.21105/joss.04368
Ford, Lucy, Shaw, Thomas B., Mattingley, Jason B. and Robinson, Gail A. (2022). Enhanced semantic memory in a case of highly superior autobiographical memory. Cortex, 151, 1-14. doi: 10.1016/j.cortex.2022.02.007
Levitis, Elizabeth, van Praag, Cassandra D Gould, Gau, Rémi, Heunis, Stephan, DuPre, Elizabeth, Kiar, Gregory, Bottenhorn, Katherine L, Glatard, Tristan, Nikolaidis, Aki, Whitaker, Kirstie Jane, Mancini, Matteo, Niso, Guiomar, Afyouni, Soroosh, Alonso-Ortiz, Eva, Appelhoff, Stefan, Arnatkeviciute, Aurina, Atay, Selim Melvin, Auer, Tibor, Baracchini, Giulia, Bayer, Johanna M M, Beauvais, Michael J S, Bijsterbosch, Janine D, Bilgin, Isil P, Bollmann, Saskia, Bollmann, Steffen, Botvinik-Nezer, Rotem, Bright, Molly G, Calhoun, Vince D, Chen, Xiao ... Maumet, Camille (2021). Centering inclusivity in the design of online conferences—An OHBM–Open Science perspective. GigaScience, 10 (8) giab051. doi: 10.1093/gigascience/giab051
Gau, Rémi, Noble, Stephanie, Heuer, Katja, Bottenhorn, Katherine L., Bilgin, Isil P., Yang, Yu-Fang, Huntenburg, Julia M., Bayer, Johanna M.M., Bethlehem, Richard A.I., Rhoads, Shawn A., Vogelbacher, Christoph, Borghesani, Valentina, Levitis, Elizabeth, Wang, Hao-Ting, Van Den Bossche, Sofie, Kobeleva, Xenia, Legarreta, Jon Haitz, Guay, Samuel, Atay, Selim Melvin, Varoquaux, Gael P., Huijser, Dorien C., Sandström, Malin S., Herholz, Peer, Nastase, Samuel A., Badhwar, AmanPreet, Dumas, Guillaume, Schwab, Simon, Moia, Stefano, Dayan, Michael ... Zuo, Xi-Nian (2021). Brainhack: Developing a culture of open, inclusive, community-driven neuroscience. Neuron, 109 (11), 1769-1775. doi: 10.1016/j.neuron.2021.04.001
Shaw, Thomas, York, Ashley, Ziaei, Maryam, Barth, Markus and Bollmann, Steffen (2020). Longitudinal Automatic Segmentation of Hippocampal Subfields (LASHiS) using multi-contrast MRI. NeuroImage, 218 116798, 116798. doi: 10.1016/j.neuroimage.2020.116798
Shaw, Thomas, York, Ashley, Barth, Markus and Bollmann, Steffen (2020). Towards optimising MRI characterisation of Tissue (TOMCAT) dataset including all Longitudinal Automatic Segmentation of Hippocampal Subfields (LASHiS) data. Data in Brief, 32 106043, 106043. doi: 10.1016/j.dib.2020.106043
Filmer, Hannah L., Ballard, Timothy, Ehrhardt, Shane E., Bollmann, Saskia, Shaw, Thomas B., Mattingley, Jason B. and Dux, Paul E. (2020). Dissociable effects of tDCS polarity on latent decision processes are associated with individual differences in neurochemical concentrations and cortical morphology. Neuropsychologia, 141 107433, 1-9. doi: 10.1016/j.neuropsychologia.2020.107433
Shaw, Thomas B., Bollmann, Steffen, Atcheson, Nicole T., Strike, Lachlan T., Guo, Christine, McMahon, Katie L., Fripp, Jurgen, Wright, Margaret J., Salvado, Olivier and Barth, Markus (2019). Non-linear realignment improves hippocampus subfield segmentation reliability. NeuroImage, 203 116206, 116206. doi: 10.1016/j.neuroimage.2019.116206
Filmer, Hannah L., Ehrhardt, Shane E., Shaw, Thomas B., Mattingley, Jason B. and Dux, Paul E. (2019). The efficacy of transcranial direct current stimulation to prefrontal areas is related to underlying cortical morphology. NeuroImage, 196, 41-48. doi: 10.1016/j.neuroimage.2019.04.026
Chopra, Sidhant, Shaw, Marnie, Shaw, Thomas, Sachdev, Perminder S., Anstey, Kaarin J. and Cherbuin, Nicolas (2018). More highly myelinated white matter tracts are associated with faster processing speed in healthy adults. NeuroImage, 171, 332-340. doi: 10.1016/j.neuroimage.2017.12.069
Conference Papers
Eftekhari, Zeinab, Shaw, Thomas B., Eckstein, Korbinian, Strasser, Bernhard, Niess, Fabian, Hingerl, Lukas, Bogner, Wolfgang and Barth, Markus (2024). Longitudinal reproducibility of 3D-FID-CRT-MRSI in the human brain at 3T and 7T. ISMRM Annual Meeting, Singapore, Singapore, 4 - 9 May 2024. Berkeley, CA, United States: International Society for Magnetic Resonance in Medicine. doi: 10.58530/2024/1852
Eftekhari, Zeinab, Shaw, Thomas B., Deelchand, Dinesh, Marjańska, Małgorzata, Bogner, Wolfgang and Barth, Markus (2024). Reliability and reproducibility of neurochemical profiles obtained with sLASER and STEAM at 3T and 7T in lower and upper limb regions. ISMRM Annual Meeting, Singapore, Singapore, 4 - 9 May 2024. Berkeley, CA, United States: International Society for Magnetic Resonance in Medicine. doi: 10.58530/2024/1835
Nikolaidis, Aki, Manchini, Matteo, Auer, Tibor, L. Bottenhorn, Katherine, Alonso-Ortiz, Eva, Gonzalez-Escamilla, Gabriel, Valk, Sofie, Glatard, Tristan, Selim Atay, Melvin, M.M. Bayer, Johanna, Bijsterbosch, Janine, Algermissen, Johannes, Beck, Natacha, Bermudez, Patrick, Poyraz Bilgin, Isil, Bollmann, Steffen, Bradley, Claire, E.J. Campbell, Megan, Caron, Bryan, Civier, Oren, Pedro Coelho, Luis, El Damaty, Shady, Das, Samir, Dugré, Mathieu, Earl, Eric, Evas, Stefanie, Lopes Fischer, Nastassja, Fu Yap, De, G. Garner, Kelly ... P. Zwiers, Marcel (2023). Proceedings of the OHBM Brainhack 2021. OHBM Brainhack 2021, Online, 16-18 June 2021. Organization for Human Brain Mapping. doi: 10.52294/258801b4-a9a9-4d30-a468-c43646391211
Chang, Jeryn, Steyn, Frederik, Ngo, Shyuan, Henderson, Robert, Guo, Christine, Bollmann, Steffen, Fripp, Jurgen, Barth, Markus and Shaw, Thomas (2023). Open-Source Hypothalamic-ForniX (OSHy-X) Atlases and Segmentation Tool for 3T and 7T. Joint Annual Meeting ISMRM-ESMRMB & ISMRT 31st Annual Meeting, London, United Kingdom, 7-12 May 2022. Concord, CA United States: International Society for Magnetic Resonance in Medicine. doi: 10.58530/2022/3808
Thesis
Shaw, Thomas (2021). Computational in vivo tissue characterisation for multi-contrast high-resolution magnetic resonance imaging data. PhD Thesis, Queensland Brain Institute, The University of Queensland. doi: 10.14264/ae6e21a
Data Collection
Filmer, Hannah L, Ehrhardt, Shane E, Bollmann, Saskia, Shaw, Thomas B, Mattingley, Jason B and Dux, Paul E (2019). Accounting for variability in the efficacy of tDCS with cortical structure and neurochemicals. The University of Queensland. (Dataset) doi: 10.14264/uql.2019.12