Project Summary

Janet Alder, Ph.D. (Young Investigator 2000) of Robert Wood Johnson Medical School, is attempting to understand the role of growth factors in the ability of nerve cells to communicate.  Recent studies suggest that growth factors may be deficient in patients with depression.   Specifically, the study will investigate the effects of growth factors on genes involved in synaptic communication between nerve cells.  Growth factor will be applied to hippocampal nerve cells and the effect on nerve cell communications will be determined by electrical recordings.  Then, the effect of growth factor on genes will be examined using a technique which identified changes in gene activity in nerve cells treated with growth factor, compared to untreated controls.  This study has the potential to reveal mechanisms by which growth factors promote changes associated with learning memory, and the reasons that these mechanisms fail in psychiatric and neurodegenerative disorders.

Program Area: MOOD DISORDERS\Depression (Unipolar)

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