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Laboratory of Sex-Informed Translational Neuroscience

Stress Response, Endocannabinoids, and Microbiome

The Role of Endocannabinoids in Modulating PTSD-related Inflammation and Behavior (PRIME) Study

This project is aimed at investigating the role of the endocannabinoid system in modulating inflammatory response and PTSD-related biobehavioral domains (symptom severity, emotion regulation, arousal).

Funding: Women’s Brain Initiative Grant

 

PTSD-related Inflammation and the Gut Microbiome (PRIME-M)

This project leverages and extends the PRIME study to investigate the role of intestinal microbiota in PTSD.

Funding: Women’s Brain Initiative

PTSD and the Vaginal Microbiome (PRIME-V)

This project leverages and extends the PRIME study to investigate the role of vaginal microbiota in women with PTSD vs healthy controls.

Funding: Mass Life Sciences Center First Look Award

Stress Response, Endocannabinoids, and Sex-Differences

Stress, Endocannabinoids and Gonadal Steroids in Perimenopausal Depression

This project is aimed at investigating whether dysregulation in endocannabinoid signaling due to estradiol fluctuations during perimenopause underlie alterations in affective response

Funding: ROSA Center U54 Pilot Award

Endocannabinoids, Stress and Sleep in Women

This study investigates the role of endocannabinoids in mediating stress response elicited by a stress-provoking sleep fragmentation procedure in healthy women undergoing an estrogen-suppression paradigm.

Funding: ROSA Center U54 Pilot Award

Alcohol and Substance Use Disorders

The Endocannabinoids, Craving, Stress and Pain (ESCAPE) Study

This project is aimed at exploring whether exogenous modulation of the endocannabinoid system via palmitoylethanolamide administration reduces subjective stress, stress-induced craving and pain perception in subjects with opioid use disorder (OUD).

Funding: McGraw Opioid Innovator Award

Trauma Time and Load and Biobehavioral Features of Alcohol Use Disorders

In collaboration with the Clinical NeuroImaging Research Core at the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism (NIAAA) at NIH, this project aims at uncovering the effects of trauma timing and load in modulating key brain-behavioral features of alcohol use disorders, and sex-differences therein.

Funding: NIAAA Intramural Research Program and Mary Ann Tynan Fellowship

Early-life and chronic stress in Functional Neurological/ Conversion disorders

Childhood Trauma, Epi(genetics) factors and Brain-behavioral Features of Functional Neurological/Conversion disorders

In collaboration with the Brigham and Women’s Division of Neuropsychiatry and with the National Institute on Neurological Disorders and Stroke (NINDS) at NIH, this project, which began in 2020, examines the role of gene x environment (childhood trauma) interactions in shaping brain circuitry underlying several key clinical and behavioral features of FND.

Funding: NINDS Intramural Research Program and Mary Ann Tynan Fellowship

The Dark Side of Functional Neurological/Conversion Disorders and PTSD

In collaboration with the Brigham and Women’s Division of Neuropsychiatry, this project aims at examining common mechanisms shared across Functional Neurological/ Conversion disorders and PTSD, with a focus on stress and inflammatory response.

Funding: Women’s Brain Initiative Grant and Mary Ann Tynan Fellowship

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