Project 175902

The proposed CIHR Emerging Team in Concurrent Disorders based at CAMH in Toronto would be a hub for research and training in the biobehavioural investigations of mechanisms which explain the co-morbidity of addictions in persons with psychotic disorders such as schizophrenia. Using a multi-disciplinary approach which brings together some of the leading Canadian translational and clinical researchers from mental health and/or addictions backgrounds, we propose to study factors which may lead to the initiation and maintenance of addictive behaviours (e.g. tobacco and cannabis addictions) in co-morbid patients, in comparison to age- and gender-matched persons with either the mental health or addictive disorder alone, and healthy controls. We would also bring together multi-modal technologies for these investigations, including animal models of psychiatric and addictive disorders, clinical descriptive studies, neurocognition, behavioural psychopharmacology and human laboratory studies, neuroimaging (PET and fMRI), molecular genetics and social policy and prevention approaches. An integrated knowledge transation and training components will be built into the proposed Emerging Team. We believe that the proposed Emerging Team will make CAMH one of the leading research and training centres in the world for the study of the biology of concurrent disorders.