Paul Laurienti
Wake Forest University, NC·Neuroscience
The brain works as a set of networks: regions that talk to each other in coordinated patterns. Substances such as alcohol and nicotine may change how these networks are wired and how they shift over time.
- Fields
Neuroscience
Biomedical Engineering
Psychology
- Topics
network neuroscience
functional brain networks
fMRI
- Grants
- 3 known grants, through Apr 2028
What they work on
- Determine how nicotine vaping changes brain structure, function, blood flow and connectivity in adolescents, imaging 360 current vapers and never tobacco users twice, 18 months apart.
- Test whether adolescent vaping affects attention, memory, executive function, social cognition and emotion processing, and whether it shifts autonomic nervous system balance toward sympathetic tone.
- Develop mathematical models and simulations of the impervious functional network (iFN), brain connections that resist synchronization, alongside the standard cooperative network.
- Apply combined cooperative and impervious network measures to the NCANDA adolescent imaging dataset to predict future alcohol drinking.
- Identify dynamic connectivity patterns in the default mode, salience and sensorimotor networks that mark vulnerability to hazardous drinking, using Hidden Semi-Markov Modeling and machine learning on NCANDA data.
- Test whether theta burst stimulation of the medial prefrontal cortex changes dynamic network connectivity in people with alcohol use disorder, compared with sham treatment.
More about the research
This research uses human brain imaging and mathematical tools from network science to understand those changes. It asks which network patterns signal risk for heavy drinking, how nicotine vaping affects the developing teenage brain, and what new network ideas could better describe normal and disordered brain function.
Why it matters
These studies could help identify brain-network markers that flag young people at risk of hazardous drinking before problems develop. They could also guide new brain-stimulation or behavioral treatments for alcohol use disorder, a condition where biomarker and treatment efforts have repeatedly failed. The adolescent vaping study will provide longitudinal data on how vaping affects brain, cognitive and nervous system development. That information is meant to shape vaping prevention messages for teens.
Known grants
From NIH and NSF research grants. Labs often have other funding we can't see.
Project 2 - Impact of Adolescent Vaping on Brain Health
NIH · May 2023 – Apr 2028
Project 1: Dynamic functional brain network phenotypes associated with vulnerability to hazardous alcohol consumption
NIH · Dec 2017 – Nov 2027
CRCNS: Functional Brain Networks with Tensioned Stability for Optimal Processing
NIH · Sep 2021 – Aug 2026
Closest labs
Merideth A. Addicott
Wake Forest University, NC·Neuroscience
Compare gray matter volume, white matter integrity, cerebral blood flow and cognitive performance among ex-smokers who quit, ex-smokers who switched to e-cigarettes, current smokers and never-smokers.
Stephen Wilson
Pennsylvania State University, PA·Psychology
Examine whether moment-to-moment changes in how separated the default mode and executive control networks are predict the risk of a smoking lapse, using an fMRI lapse task in adults after 12 hours without nicotine.
Joy Schmitz
University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston, TX·Medicine & Clinical Research
Test whether adding active rather than sham deep TMS with an H4 coil to contingency management raises abstinence, increases cocaine-negative urines and reduces craving in people who do not respond to contingency management alone.
The school
Wake Forest University: 27 labs on PI Pages, $345M a year on research, 54 research doctorates a year.
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