Project Summary

Christine S. Barr, VMD, Ph.D. (Young Investigator 2004) of the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism/National Institutes of Health, using a new technology called microarrays to study the activity of many genes simultaneously plans to find novel molecular pathways of chronic stress in post-mortem brain tissue of macaques. Chronic stress in humans may increase susceptibility to depression; and people with a genetic variant in the serotonin transporter, 5-HTTLPR, are more likely to get depressed after stress. Using brains archived from macaques exposed to stress early in life, Dr. Barr will identify gene pathways altered due to chronic stress and compare them to those in animals that have a serotonin transporter variant analogous to the human version. These experiments should demonstrate gene systems activated with chronic stress, enhance understanding of the transporter variant’s role and provide possible targets for developing new depression treatments.

Program Area: MOOD DISORDERS\Unipolar Depression

Search Again