Behavioral and Pharmacologic Analysis of Drug Abuse (KO5)
Behavioral Psychopharmacology Research Laboratory, McLean Hospital
Scott E. Lukas, Ph.D.
This KO5 Senior Scientist Award permits the candidate to continue his career development in drug abuse research. During the past ten years as a KO2 awardee the candidate has spent 80-85% of his time engaged in drug abuse research. His overall research goal is to use multiple tools to study reinforcing efficacy, polydrug abuse and potential pharmacotherapies for drug and alcohol abuse. The research plan is based on three currently funded RO1 grants on which the candidate is the Principal Investigator and three additional grants on which he serves as co-investigator. The candidate's research interests have changed slightly by focusing all of his energy on clinical research and has eliminated his involvement in non human primate research. This decision was made partly because of recommendations made during the last competitive review of his KO2 application and partly because the candidate has now become a senior scientist in the field of human psychopharmacology. This change in his status in the field has prompted a shift to developing a solid base for his independent research program that also will support the training of predominantly women and minority subjects/postdoctoral trainees. The candidate continues to use electroencephalographic activity, physiological activity, plasma drug levels and instrumental measures of subjective mood states as dependent variables to quantify the effects of cocaine, marihuana and ethanol in adult volunteers. The candidate continues to focus his attention on the effects of drugs of abuse on women, and is currently studying ethnic differences in the pharmacokinetic and pharmacodynamic effects of cocaine.
The candidate has made a strong commitment to research and over the next five years of his professional growth he will study the similarities between cocaine- and tobacco-related cues and their effects on brain electrical activity, quantify sex-related differences in the pharmacokinetic and pharmacodynamic response to i.v. and i.n. cocaine, evaluate the usefulness of nicotine and estrogen transdermal patches as potential pharmacotherapies for cocaine abuse, co-register EEG data with three dimensional MRI and study the effects of a Chinese herbal medicine, kudzu, as a possible treatment for alcohol abuse. The present application is being sought to provide the candidate with continued stability of support essential for his sustained commitment to research in the field of drug abuse and to ensure his continued level of productivity not only as a senior scientist, but as a mentor for the next generation of drug abuse scientists.
Key words: cocaine, marihuana, ethanol, nicotine, EEG, kudzu, polydrug abuse, sex differences, pharmacokinetics, brain imaging, clinical trials, cue-induced craving, pharmacotherapies, family history of alcoholism.
Grant Support: NIDA: KO5 DA00343, Behavioral and Pharmacologic Analysis of Drug Abuse
Program Site: Behavioral Psychopharmacology Laboratory/NeuroImaging Center, McLean Hospital.
Program Director: Scott E. Lukas, Ph.D., Behavioral Psychopharmacology Research Laboratory, McLean Hospital, 115 Mill St., Belmont, MA 02478. e-mail address: Lukas@mcLean.harvard.edu
Training Opportunities: None.
Representative Publications:
Maas LC, Lukas SE, Kaufman MJ, Weiss RD, Daniels SL, Rogers VW, Kukes TJ, Renshaw PF. Functional magnetic resonance imaging of cue-induced cocaine craving in the human brain. Am J Psychiatry 1998;155: 124-26
Dorsey CM, Teicher M, Cohen-Zion M, Stefanovic L, Harper D, Satlin A, Tartarini W, Harper D, Lukas SE. Core body temperature and sleep of older female insomniacs before and after passive body heating. Sleep 1999;22:891-8
Renshaw PF, Daniels S, Lundahl LH, Rogers V, Lukas SE. Short-term treatment with citicoline (CDP-choline) attenuates some measures of craving in cocaine-dependent subjects: A preliminary report. Psychopharmacology 1999;142:132-8
Cowan RL, de Frederick B, Rainey M, Levin JM, Maas LC, Bang J, Hennen J, Lukas SE, Renshaw PF. Sex differences in response to red and blue light in human primary visual cortex:a bold fMRI study.Psychiatry Res Neuroimag 2000;100: 129-38
Kouri, EM, Stull, M, Lukas, SE. Nicotine alters some of cocaine's subjective effects in the absence of physiological or pharmacokinetic changes. Pharmacol Biochem Behav 2001;69: 209-17
Lukas SE, Orozco S. Ethanol increases plasma ∆9-tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) levels and subjective effects after marihuana smoking in human volunteers. Drug Alcohol Depend 2001; 64: 143-149