November 7, 2013 - Postdoctoral fellow, Greg Perlman, PhD received a NARSAD Young Investigator Grant from the Brain & Behavior Research Foundation to investigate the use of event-related potentials (ERPs) as biomarkers for schizophrenia and severe mood disorder. If Dr. Perlman’s hypotheses are confirmed, ERPs — obtained inexpensively and noninvasively via EEG — could be used to help identify individuals at risk for psychiatric disorders and to help with differential diagnosis.
Distinguished Professor Evelyn Bromet, PhD and Associate Professor Roman Kotov, PhD will serve as Dr. Perlman’s mentors, while Department Chair Ramin Parsey, MD, PhD will be a consultant.
Four ERP abnormalities are widely studied in association with schizophrenia and severe mood disorders, but researchers do not yet know if they are indicative of inherited traits that put people at risk for these disorders, if they are consequences of the disorders, or if they are the result of various treatments. Dr. Perlman plans to investigate these questions by comparing ERP results among participants in the Suffolk County Mental Health Project with ERPs of their well siblings and ERPs of neighborhood controls. The presence of abnormalities in Suffolk County Project participants and their siblings, but not in healthy controls, would indicate that they reflect inherited traits; conversely, their presence in Suffolk County project participants but not in their healthy siblings would suggest that they are direct or indirect consequences of the disorder.
In his letter of support for the project, Dr. Parsey described Dr. Perlman as “a talented, energetic and eager young researcher with an excellent foundation of training who is ready to continue his pursuit of an academic career.” He predicted that Dr. Perlman will develop into an outstanding independent investigator.
