New studies will generally require a certain amount of piloting before “real” data can be acquired. This can be thought of in two phases:

1. The programming, debugging, and piloting of your behavioural task. This part does not depend on interaction with the scanner or peripherals other than button presses.
2. The second is the setup of the MRI scanning protocol, sequences, durations, etc. At this stage a pilot would also involve testing a full 'dry run' of your imaging session to check stimulus timing, data consistency etc.

Both these stages occur before actual data collection starts and before hours are charged. For questions about experimental and project design, we recommend holding a meeting with Ari (Ari.Lingeswaran@rhul.ac.uk)

Typically, pilot time is booked as project time but will not or only partially count towards scanning costs. Note: when booking the scanner for pilot purposes indicate this with the remark 'pilot' in the summary field.

Developing experimental paradigms and stimuli are the responsibility of the experimenter. However, we try to help when we can (e.g., see our skills database). Please contact Ari.Lingeswaran@rhul.ac.uk if you have specific questions about the peripheral equipment.

When piloting at the scanner, you are expected to already have a fully functional behavioral experiment that responds adequately to button presses and pulses (which arrive as XXXXX). So before planning a dry run at the MRI scanner, please ensure that your task works correctly on our stimulus PC. If a task runs on the stim PC (it displays correctly on the screen, button presses and 't's are properly registered), it should be transferable to the actual scanner environment with little to no modifications.

Ari will be happy to help you set up your MRI protocol. Please let Ari know when you are preparing a study and require assistance or advice. We have a default set of protocols that can be used 'as is' or tweaked for the specific research question. Please make sure to check your pilot data carefully.

In some cases, more time might be required. There can be several reasons for this, e.g. because a study requires MRI protocols that are not part of the default protocol set, or a study uses a custom experimental set-up that requires optimization in the scanning environment.

If you think this applies to your situation, get in touch with us to discuss how much time is reasonable. One factor taken into account when determining how much pilot time is provided is to what extent sequences or a set-up might be useful in a broader context, i.e. for other projects / partners.