The resolution recognized that science stands on a threshold of momentous promise for understanding how this most sensitive and complicated part of the human body develops and functions and for treating brain disorders that affect more than 50 million Americans each year. The Center is now the only NIH-supported primate center where a team of developmental neuroscientists is charged with investigating how brain and neuroendocrine systems mature and the manners in which the normal process of development may be affected by disease.
Monkeys are invaluable in certain studies because of their genetic relationship to humans.
The organization of the primate central nervous system, especially the forebrain, is much more complex than in rodents and other laboratory species. Because of their similarity to humans, monkeys make the most appropriate subjects for studies of perception, learning , memory, cognition, motivational states associated with hunger, thirst and sex. Because the primate brain shares with humans a high degree of plasticity, monkeys are subjects of choice for studying neural plasticity and behaviors dependent on social learning. Finally, the primate brain is essential for studies of the neuroendocrine control of sexual development, which is unique to primates. It is possible for them to achieve a valuable vertical integration of neurobiological information.