The primary aim of the Center for Functional Brain Imaging at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center is to substantially expand existing clinical and basic research programs in mental disorders by the judicious introduction of PET functional brain imaging. This Center will provide the infrastructure for the initiation of a diverse group of new research projects using PET to study mental disorders. These projects include: correlation of magnetic resonance spectroscopy abnormalities to regional changes in glucose metabolism and blood flow in aged, demented, schizophrenic and autistic patient groups; measuring regional brain function after serotonergic pharmacological challenges in obsessive-compulsive and suicidal patients; development of new cognitive tasks for specific activation of frontal lobe regions; studying metabolic changes after sleep deprivation in normal aged and depressed populations; combining event-related potential data with regional activation seen by PET to elucidate the basis for shifting attention; measuring D2 receptor occupancy in cortical structures during controlled neuroleptic therapy of schizophrenics; correlation of focal mesial-temporal metabolic defects to clinical courses of demented patients; determination of frontal lobe dysfunction in young patients with anti-social personalities; and examining the metabolic consequences of sub-cortical white matter MRI hyperintensity lesions in elderly depressives. This group of proposals all arise from investigators in funded psychiatry and psychology research groups who bring considerable expertise to each project and carefully characterized patient populations. The inclusion in the Neurocognitive Core of key investigators in the Department of Psychology at Carnegie Mellon University and the development of collaborative projects further enriches the Center and the proposed research. We believe that the integration of novel, experimental and clinical paradigms with straightforward, established PET techniques is the most logical approach for achieving the initial aims of this Center. The availability of new receptor ligand tracers through the radiochemistry group will create the basis for the next phase of clinical imaging research in the Center.
Showing the most recent 10 out of 15 publications
