Wendy Lynch
University of Virginia, VA·Neuroscience
Why do some people relapse after quitting drugs, and why does addiction often progress faster in women? Substance use disorder affects millions of people.
- Fields
Neuroscience
Pharmacology
Psychology
- Topics
addiction
substance use disorder
opioid use disorder
- Grants
- 2 known grants, through May 2027
What they work on
- Determine how doses of inhibitory and excitatory low-intensity focused ultrasound (LIFU) applied to the rat dorsomedial prefrontal cortex change markers of neuronal activity and dopamine and glutamate signaling during early and late opioid withdrawal.
- Test whether a 7-day course of excitatory LIFU to the dorsomedial prefrontal cortex during early withdrawal blocks the incubation of opioid craving and reduces relapse in male and female rats.
- Test whether a 7-day course of inhibitory LIFU during late withdrawal reduces opioid craving and relapse vulnerability, relating behavior to neurochemical markers.
- Use local blocking of nucleus accumbens dopamine D1 and glutamate AMPA receptors to test whether control of cocaine seeking shifts between them earlier in females with estradiol than in males.
- Test whether estrogen receptors regulate the gene expression changes behind addiction-like cocaine motivation, using RNA sequencing and ChIP-sequencing of rat brain tissue.
- Test whether female rats develop an addiction-like phenotype for fentanyl sooner during abstinence than males, using an extended-access self-administration procedure.
More about the research
About half of patients treated with current medications for opioid use disorder (OUD) relapse. Women often show a "telescoping effect," meeting the criteria for addiction or seeking treatment after fewer years of drug use than men. Using rat models, this research studies the brain circuits behind craving and relapse. It tests a new non-drug way to adjust those circuits and looks for the molecular changes that make females vulnerable sooner.
Why it matters
About half of people treated for opioid use disorder relapse, so new approaches are needed. If focused ultrasound reduces craving in rats, it could move toward human trials as a non-drug, non-invasive anti-relapse treatment. Identifying the receptor and estrogen-driven gene changes behind faster addiction in females may point to targets for preventing the telescoping effect in women using cocaine or opioids.
Known grants
From NIH and NSF research grants. Labs often have other funding we can't see.
Closest labs
Mary Kay Lobo
University of Maryland, Baltimore, MD·Neuroscience
Map cellular, synaptic plasticity and molecular changes in defined cell subtypes of the medial prefrontal cortex and nucleus accumbens in mice exposed to fentanyl during the equivalent of human gestation, from weaning through adolescence.
James M Otis
Medical University of South Carolina, SC·Neuroscience
Track single posterior paraventricular thalamus neurons that project to the nucleus accumbens across heroin self-administration, extinction, and reinstatement in mice, using two-photon calcium imaging.
John Mantsch
Medical College of Wisconsin, WI·Neuroscience
Test whether chronic unpredictable stress reduces dendritic spines on D2 receptor–expressing prelimbic neurons that project to the nucleus accumbens core, causing sex-dependent set-shifting deficits in mice.
The school
University of Virginia: 43 labs on PI Pages, $814M a year on research, 413 research doctorates a year.
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