Kenneth Kishida
Wake Forest University, NC·Neuroscience
Dopamine, serotonin and norepinephrine are chemical messengers in the brain. They shape motivation, learning, decision-making and feelings, and they are involved in substance use disorder and in nearly all psychiatric illnesses.
- Fields
Neuroscience
Chemistry
Biomedical Engineering
- Topics
dopamine
serotonin
norepinephrine
- Grants
- 1 known grant, through Dec 2030
What they work on
- Test whether the background signal in fast scan cyclic voltammetry recordings, an electrochemical method for measuring neurotransmitters, can be quantitatively characterized, mathematically modeled and subtracted in living-brain experiments.
- Correct the in vitro bias of calibration models trained outside the brain by characterizing FSCV background signals under in vivo, ex vivo and in vitro conditions.
- Extend model-based electrochemistry to detect norepinephrine alongside dopamine and serotonin with sub-second timing, for use in preclinical animal models and human clinical neuroscience research.
- Build mathematical models from large controlled datasets that separate biological interferents from true noise, and share them with calibration methods through open-source repositories.
More about the research
In several brain regions two or more of them are released together. Yet there has been no way to track all three at once, in real time, in a living brain. Closing this gap would show how these systems work together as animals and people move through the world.
Why it matters
Better ways to measure dopamine, serotonin and norepinephrine together could help researchers understand the brain mechanisms behind addiction, compulsive drug use and psychiatric illness. The planned open-source models could be applied to existing and future recordings from rodents and from people undergoing intracranial measurements. This may give clearer insight into how these systems shape mood, motivation and behavior.
Known grants
From NIH and NSF research grants. Labs often have other funding we can't see.
Closest labs
Jared Bagley
Binghamton University, NY·Neuroscience·Early-career
Test whether mouse strains genetically predisposed to extreme cocaine self-administration differ in baseline and acute cocaine-evoked dopamine release in the nucleus accumbens shell, measured with fast-scan cyclic voltammetry.
Elizabeth Mietlicki-Baase
University at Buffalo, NY·Neuroscience
Test whether activating amylin receptors in the ventral tegmental area suppresses rapid dopamine release in the nucleus accumbens core in response to fat in the mouth, measured with fast-scan cyclic voltammetry.
Alexandra Cohen
Emory University, GA·Psychology·Early-career
Test how emotions triggered by wins and losses in a probabilistic reinforcement learning task affect memory and dopamine- and norepinephrine-linked brain function, comparing children, adolescents and adults.
The school
Wake Forest University: 27 labs on PI Pages, $345M a year on research, 54 research doctorates a year.
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