(Press-News.org) Washington, D.C. – Today, BD², or Breakthrough Discoveries for thriving with Bipolar Disorder, announced its third round of Discovery Research grants, totaling nearly $18 million – expanding a comprehensive global effort to examine the key mechanisms of bipolar disorder. Multidisciplinary teams of scientists and clinicians include leads from the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, Mass General Brigham, Weill Cornell Medicine, and the University of Minnesota.
These teams represent a unique cohort of successful Discovery Grantees, as they will all use neuromodulation to explore human neural circuitry in bipolar disorder. These teams will each receive grants of up to $4.5 million over three years, joining current Discovery Research grantees to undertake targeted, innovative research that deepens the understanding of bipolar disorder.
“The Discovery Research program is advancing our understanding of the causal mechanisms of bipolar disorder. These new projects offer a pivotal opportunity to explore neural circuits and translate that knowledge into innovative treatment approaches. Through this funding, we will drive discovery, share insights across BD², and foster collaboration that accelerates better care for everyone living with bipolar disorder,” said Cara Altimus, PhD, Managing Director of BD².
With these new grants, BD² has dedicated over $106 million in funding to research that accelerates the scientific understanding of bipolar disorder and advances clinical care through cross-disciplinary collaboration, data sharing, and real-time learning. This third round of Discovery Research grantees will focus on using state of the art neuromodulation techniques, to examine and manipulate human brain circuits and uncover the underlying features of bipolar disorder, with the potential to translate to new treatment modalities. Areas of study are:
Ignacio Saez, PhD, of the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai will lead a team that will chronically record brain activity in people with bipolar to detect and characterize changes in network dynamics that coincide with changes in mood state. These recordings will be coupled with detailed clinical detail to create a comprehensive picture of mood state switching, and have the potential to inform the development of targeted neuromodulation treatments.
Michael Fox, MD, PhD, of Mass General Brigham and his team in the Center for Brain Circuit Therapeutics aim to map psychiatric symptoms that are characteristic of bipolar to regions of the human brain. They seek to better understand how these symptoms are caused on the circuit level by studying changes in psychiatric symptoms in patients with focal brain damage, in patients receiving focal brain stimulation, in postmortem tissue, and in individuals with bipolar. Importantly, the brain circuit identification will help pinpoint effective therapeutic targets for bipolar disorder.
Charles Lynch, PhD, of Weill Cornell Medicine, an early career researcher, and his team will use precision neuroimaging tools to map the brains of individuals with bipolar disorder and manipulate brain circuits to establish their causal role in mood regulation. By mapping the brain circuits in different states, the team endeavors to identify the brain circuitry responsible for mood instability.
Ziad Nahas, MD, MSCR, of University of Minnesota will lead his team to test a novel, personalized type of brain stimulation that has been used to improve mood and thinking in people with unipolar depression in individuals with bipolar disorder. By using this technique in conjunction with precision functional mapping, the team aims to identify the underlying mechanisms of mood switching in bipolar disorder and use optimal tuning to relieve symptoms.
Learn more about the projects and teams.
“One of the biggest challenges in bipolar disorder is the lack of effective treatments, largely due to gaps in our understanding of the disorder’s underlying biology. The Discovery Research program empowers grantees to dedicate the time, resources, and expertise needed to investigate the biological mechanisms of bipolar disorder. By doing so, we aim to accelerate scientific discovery, drive meaningful advances in treatment, and move closer to realizing our vision that all those with bipolar disorder lead thriving lives,” said Daniel Pham, BD² Discovery Research Program Director.
The first and second rounds of Discovery Research grantees include the study of the genetic risk factors of bipolar disorder, the molecular and circuit level mechanisms underlying sleep disruption in bipolar, mechanisms of action for drug-based therapies , and more.
BD² recently announced a fourth round of funding opportunities, inviting teams to apply for up to $4.5 million per grant to undertake groundbreaking research into the genetic, molecular, cellular, circuit, and behavioral mechanisms of bipolar disorder. More on the request for applications here.
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About BD²: Breakthrough Discoveries for thriving with Bipolar Disorder is the first organization focused on funding and advancing research and care for bipolar disorder on a global scale. Our collaborative, open-science approach is designed to transform and shorten the time it takes for scientific breakthroughs to make a meaningful difference in the lives of the tens of millions of people with bipolar disorder. The BD² Discovery Grants, Brain Omics, Genetics Platforms, and the Integrated Network are designed to share data, methods, and resources across initiatives and the bipolar disorder research community. For more information, please visit bipolardiscoveries.org.
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