Established in 1967, the UNC IDDRC is one of 14 Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities Research Centers supported by the Eunice Kennedy Shriver
National Institutes of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD). The UNC IDDRC, led by Director Joe Piven, M.D., and Associate Director Gabriel Dichter, Ph.D.,
offers three multi-component research cores to support funded investigators conducting studies relevant to understanding the pathogenesis and treatment of neurodevelopmental
disorders. IDDRC investigators come from a wide range of disciplines in clinical and basic science, including members of the Carolina Center for Genome Sciences, the Eshelman School
of Pharmacy, the Gillings School of Public Health, the UNC Neuroscience Center, and more than 20 different UNC Departments. In addition to maintaining state-of-the-art core
facilities, the IDDRC has recently initiated a signature research project, ‘Neural Circuit Regulation of Social Motivation,’ which utilizes cutting-edge optogenetic approaches in
mice, and functional brain imaging in humans, to investigate the role of oxytocin in social deficits associated with autism spectrum disorders.
Major research themes in the IDDRC include:
- Autism and related syndromes, focusing on gene-brain-behavior relationships
- Early development of brain and behavior, with longitudinal studies in normal and at risk populations
- Early detection and intervention, including psychopharmacology, early education/behavioral programs, and preclinical, high-throughput drug discovery and gene therapy initiatives
IDDRC Investigators and Projects
IDDRC Cores
Clinical Translational Core
Participant Registries
Brain Measurement Laboratories
Preclinical Core
Mouse Behavioral Phenotyping Laboratory
Confocal and Multiphoton Microscopy Facility
Animal Brain Imaging Analysis
Bioinformatics/Biostatistics Core
Membership and Access
Links to NICHD
NICHD Home
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