Dr. Borgland received her PhD in Pharmacology/Neuroscience from the University of Sydney, Australia in 2002 and then went on to complete her Post-Doct
Impulse control problems such as gambling, hyper-sexuality and other addictive behaviours are among the most disturbing side-effects that can occur when people with Parkinson's disease are treated with drugs that activate dopamine receptors in their brain cells.
"Drug addiction and these other impulse control disorders are really devastating disorders," says Dr. Borgland. "People are aware they have them, and they would like to change, but for some reason they just can't do it. It's an interesting area to study because it has a lot of broad applications."
Borgland is specifically investigating the role that dopamine plays in the orbitofrontal cortex, a region of the brain that is involved in impulse control. Dopamine neurons located in a group of neurons in the centre of the brain, known as the ventral tegmental area, communicate with the orbitofrontal cortex, and can release dopamine into this region. Researchers believe dopamine in that region regulates impulsive behaviours.
Dopamine neurons located in this area, part of the midbrain, are relatively unspared by Parkinson's disease. But when between 8 to10 percent of people with Parkinson's take drugs to treat the motor control problems they experience, those drugs are affecting the dopamine release in the ventral orbitofrontal cortex. If the drugs alter the way the neurons in this area communicate, that may cause the impulse control and addiction problems that these people experience.
Before researchers can adapt existing drugs or design new ones to try to regulate the dopamine implicated in these impulse control issues, they need to understand more about how the dopamine-producing neurons in this part of the brain regulate behaviours.
