Name:	TMRI GC Imaging
Title:	Brain imaging studies of pre-frontal glutamate concentration, perfusion and activity.
Researchers:
Funding Body:	Pfizer
Funding Awarded:	£1,037,764
Start Date:	01/06/2009
End Date:	31/05/2012

 

Aims:

The overall aim of this project is to examine the role of glutamate in relation to:

• the key features of the disorder and as a potential marker of therapeutic efficacy in patients with schizophrenia
• the DISC1 translocation in the original family
• TNIK and other risk markers for psychosis

Summary

We propose here to conduct complementary investigations of pre-frontal glutamate concentration, perfusion and cortical activity in patients with acute schizophrenia and healthy controls (who will also have repeat examinations), and in individuals from the DISC1 family with and without schizophrenia, and in patients stratified by TNIK and other genetic variants into ‘high’ and ‘low’ risk groups. Together with studies being conducted in parallel on DISC1 transgenic mice, this will provide important new insights into the relationship between a biochemical model of psychosis and the disorder, the effects of DISC1 and other genetic risk markers, and possibly the power of brain imaging to predict treatment response.