Antonia Fritsch

This translational project investigates sex-dependent behavioral effects of faecal microbiota transplantation to microbiome-depleted mice from AMD patients (selected based on their aggressive and impulsive traits from Q01), as well as healthy controls. Impulsivity will be assessed via the continuous performance test and responses towards acute threat via the escalated resident intruder test. The goal is to determine the sex-dependent effects of faecal transplantation on selected readouts involved in the transfer of the patient’s phenotype to the mice, such as immune parameters, sex hormones, neuronal activity (and morphology, e.g., neurite outgrowth, spines, etc.), and gene expression (e.g., Rbfox1 from prior studies and novel candidates from C01 and C04).

TDCS will be used as an interventional tool to decrease aggression. Using a simultaneous tDCS – fMRI approach, the project aims to enhance cognitive control by repeated prefrontal brain stimulation, investigating its effect on aggression. In addition to gauging tDCS responsivity, identifying the role of individual factors such as genetic profiles in aggression will be a particular focus of this project. By examining brain activity at multiple time points (e.g., before, during multiple stimulation sessions and after tDCS), it will add to the understanding of mechanisms underlying neural tDCS effects and help to identify individual factors that predict responsiveness to the stimulation. To determine the therapeutic potential, we will include psychiatric patients with substance use problems, a group of criminal, violent offenders, and healthy matched controls.

The central recruitment platform for collecting and curating a longitudinal dataset for studying individual aggression dynamics related to the neural, cognitive-emotional, neurobiological, psychopathological and environmental factors in patient groups.