Dr. Dagher receives major Foundation grant from CIHR

BIC Principal investigator Dr. Alain Dagher receives $2.1M in Foundation grant from CIHR to study the brain's dopamine systems with brain imaging.

Functional Neuroimaging of dopamine systems: application to Parkinson's Disease, addiction and obesity.

The main goal is to understand the function of brain systems involved in reward, motivation, learning and decision-making. 

(1) identify brain endophenotypes that confer vulnerability to disorders of motivated choice such as obesity and addiction. Endophenotypes are both behavioral and brain-based (anatomical and functional brain imaging). They are of interest because underlying risk factors (genetic or environmental) have greater penetrance at the level of brain function than at the level of outcomes such as body weight or drug use. Imaging measures include anatomical MRI, resting state functional connectivity, and positron emission tomography.

(2) relate these endophentopypes to brain processes. We will combine computational models of learning, decision making and self-control with fMRI to explain how dysfunction in identified brain systems leads to maladaptive choices.

(3) use brain imaging to map the progression of Parkinson’s Disease and relate this to clinical manifestations such as motor dysfunction, disorders of mood and motivation, and dementia. Specifically, to test the network spread hypothesis of the disease, wherein intrinsic brain networks are especially vulnerable to the pathogenic process.

Understanding the factors that render individuals vulnerable to addiction and obesity has major public health implications. The neuroscience of tobacco addiction was a major driver of public policy changes that have reduced the incidence of smoking in North America. Similarly, the neuroscience of obesity is already starting to influence public policy. Understanding how the obesogenic environment interacts with a vulnerable brain is crucial to the promotion and development of health policy. Obesity shares a common etiology with other gene-by-environment diseases that affect the dopamine system such as anxiety, schizophrenia, and drug addiction, and hence this research has broad applicability.

Our goal is not only to understand the neural processes that lead to obesity or addiction, but also to identify, test and promote interventions at both the individual (e.g. behavioural therapy) and societal (e.g. public policy, education) level. Both types of interventions benefit from an understanding of the underlying neuroscience of maladaptive choice. We will test behavioral interventions in young people at risk of alcoholism or obesity, and relate success or failure to cognitive and brain imaging measures.