Programs:

Summary

Cognitive deficits in schizophrenia are profoundly disabling and not adequately treated by current medication regimens. Identifying the neural circuitry that underlies cognitive deficits in schizophrenia can guide investigations of neuropathology and the development of targeted interventions. This laboratory's research program aims to elucidate the neural bases of cognitive function in health so that we can identify how cognition breaks down in schizophrenia. We are particularly interested in the contributions of the prefrontal cortex to executive functions such as working memory, inhibition, task-switching, and error processing. Our tools include functional and structural magnetic resonance imaging, diffusion tensor imaging (DTI), saccadic measurements, and magnetoencephalography. We use these tools in complementary ways to achieve a high degree of spatial and temporal precision. This allows us to pinpoint when and where in the brain cognitive processes go awry in schizophrenia. We have recently begun using DTI to identify white matter pathways that are implicated in cognitive deficits. While schizophrenia is our primary focus, we also study individuals with autism spectrum disorders. A separate line of investigation focuses on the role of sleep in cognition. Patients with schizophrenia show a failure of sleep-dependent procedural learning and memory consolidation. We are investigating the basis of this failure using overnight polysomnography and behavioral studies.

Ongoing Projects

1. Spatiotemporal dynamics of executive function in schizophrenia: This project addresses the neural basis of executive function deficits in schizophrenia using complementary neuroimaging techniques, fMRI, MEG, and DTI.
   
   
2. Spatiotemporal dynamics of executive function in Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD): ASD is characterized by executive function deficits that may contribute to social disability. This project uses a single saccadic paradigm to study deficient inhibition and intact task-switching with fMRI, MEG, and DTI.
   
   
3. Sleep dependent procedural learning in schizophrenia: This project aims to elucidate the neural mechanisms underlying the failure of sleep-dependent procedural learning and memory consolidation in schizophrenia using polysomnography and behavioral studies.

1. MIND clinical imaging consortium project: A joint study of first episode and chronic schizophrenia. This multi-site longitudinal study will address the course and neural mechanisms of schizophrenia. The goals include the identification of cognitive endophenotypes and the determination of disease progression using measures of brain anatomy and function.
   
   
2. Functional Imaging Research of Schizophrenia Test Bed, Bioinformatics Research Network (FIRST BIRN). This multi-site project focuses on the development and validation of fMRI in large-scale, multi-site studies of schizophrenia. The technical goal involves developing a distributed network infrastructure to support a federated fMRI database and to identify sources of measurement variation. The clinical objective is to use the technology developed to answer fundamental questions about brain function in schizophrenia.