• Rafael Delgado (Post-doc)

Rationale and Objectives

With the mood disorder component, affective disorders such as depression- in the Chronic Mild Stress (CMS) rat model and pharmacological rat models for schizophrenia are studied for alternations in the neuronal connectivity and metabolism in the affected brain structures. In addition neuro-anatomical target-sites of clinically active antidepressant compounds are investigated with pharmacological MRI to characterize their underlying mechanisms of actions (through which they resolve the depressive symptomatology).

Methodology

• Pharmacological MRI : to investigate brain regions of interest and drug binding
• Diffusion kurtosis imaging : to study neuronal plasticity changes
• Magnetic resonance spectroscopy : to study metabolic changes
• Volumetric & morphometric MRI : to investigate brain structural alterations
• Other supplementary studies corroborating imaging findings including electrophysiology, histology and pharmacokinetics

Examples



Fig 1 : A BOLD-fMRI-SPM providing a whole-brain view (across 32 brain slices) identifying the region-specific drug binding




Fig 2 : An example hippocampal shape change in a disease model subject group in reference with the controls.



Funding

Projects are conducted in collaboration and sponsorship from a renowned pharmaceutical industry’s R&D establishment.

Collaborations

• M. Shoaib & A.M. Blamire, Newcastle University, UK
• Ove Wiborg, University of Ahrus, Denmark