Research is conducted from the level of behavior to the level of gene expression.
I am particularly interested in opioid-receptor dependent LTP, which is best characterized in the mossy fiber projection to area CA3 of hippocampus. Secondary genes associated with LTP induction have been isolated using cDNA subtraction hybridization. Some of these are novel. Animals learn to self-administer amphetamine into their nucleus accumbens via a microdialysis probe. As this is a kind of learning, we have identified genes associated with this self administration paradigm using cDNA subtraction hybridization.