Her research in using Positron Emission Tomography (PET) to image the neurochemistry of the brain in addiction. Recent work has focused on imaging the dopamine receptors and dopamine transmission in the striatum in addiction, and the clinical relevance of these outcome measures with respect to drug self-administration and treatment response. For example, these studies show that response to treatment is predicted by dopamine signaling in the ventral striatum in cocaine abuse and recent work demonstrating that the metabotropic glutamate receptor type 5 (mGluR5) is reduced in cocaine abuse. Both of these findings have relevance to the question of how neurochemistry may be altered in addiction and how modulating neuroplasticity may be involved in behavioral changes