Neuromodulation Applications in Alcohol Use Disorder

National Institute On Alcohol Abuse And Alcoholism

Investigators

Abstract

1. Development of fMRI Neurofeedback During the past three years we have worked with collaborators in NIMH and developed and implemented several neurofeedback prototypes for the Siemens 3T Prisma scanner. We have completed the stage 1 of this study and started our recruitment for stage 2 of the study from the AUD inpatient behavioral unit. The detailed analysis of stage 1 data and manuscript preparation are under way. Based on the acquired knowledge from the stage 1, an editorial manuscript was also prepared and published (Gonzales-Castillo, Ramot, and Momenan, 2020) 2. TMS Neuromodulation of Negative Urgency We had planned to initiate another collaborative (Dr. Atlas) study in order to assess how negative urgency relates to impulsive decision-making in individuals with alcohol use disorder (AUD); and to characterize the associated hemodynamic response in prefrontal areas during using functional near infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS) imaging. Due to COVID-19 restrictions the preparation of laboratory space for this project has been delayed. However, we have made theoretical progress in setting up study tasks and procedures. A pilot sample of healthy volunteers and participants with AUD will be recruited to develop and test a novel task intended to induce negative urgency by provoking a strong negative emotional state via combined exposure to both painful stimuli and visual aversive stimuli, and subsequently testing impulsive decision-making. Moreover, we will test whether negative urgency can be modulated via prefrontal stimulation using repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation (rTMS), as this technique has been shown to affect top-down regulatory circuits (prefrontal-limbic) during emotion regulation and impulsive decision-making, which are the two key components of negative urgency.