Christa McIntyre
University of Texas at Dallas, TX·Neuroscience
Traumatic experiences can leave fear memories that are lasting and intrusive, as in post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). Exposure therapy treats these fears by repeatedly presenting reminders of the trauma with no harm, so that the brain forms a new "safe" memory.
- Fields
Neuroscience
Psychology
- Topics
vagus nerve stimulation
fear extinction
fear conditioning
- Grants
- 1 known grant, through Feb 2027
What they work on
- Test in rats whether pairing exposure with vagus nerve stimulation (VNS) produces fear extinction memories that last longer and generalize to related cues, compared with exposure alone.
- Determine whether the locus coeruleus, a brainstem source of noradrenaline, is needed for VNS to enhance fear extinction, by manipulating it with optogenetics during conditioning and extinction.
- Record neural activity at the same time in the prefrontal cortex, basolateral amygdala and hippocampus during conditioning, extinction and later testing, to see how VNS changes activity across the extinction network.
More about the research
This process is called fear extinction. Some patients struggle to retain these new memories, however, and the distress of facing reminders leads many to drop out. A treatment added alongside exposure that makes extinction stronger or easier to tolerate could help.
Why it matters
Vagus nerve stimulation could become an add-on to exposure therapy for PTSD and other anxiety and fear disorders. It may help patients form stronger and longer-lasting extinction memories and make therapy easier to tolerate. The work will also show how locus coeruleus signaling supports the brain changes behind extinction.
Known grants
From NIH and NSF research grants. Labs often have other funding we can't see.
Closest labs
Sydney Trask
Indiana University, IN·Neuroscience
Compare UCS deflation, presenting weaker versions of a feared stimulus, with standard extinction in renewal, spontaneous recovery and reinstatement tests, predicting that only deflation reduces all three forms of fear relapse.
Jun-Hyeong Cho
University of California-Riverside, CA·Neuroscience
Determine how contextual fear memory is encoded through synaptic strengthening in the hippocampus–amygdala pathway, combining engram cell labeling, optogenetics and electrophysiology.
Roger L Clem
Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, NY·Neuroscience
Test whether somatostatin interneurons in the ventral hippocampus are recruited during recall of extinguished context fear, using intersectional genetics and calcium imaging to monitor distinct groups of these cells.
The school
University of Texas at Dallas: 16 labs on PI Pages, $182M a year on research, 239 research doctorates a year.
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