Exploring mind, brain and consciousness
Hugo Critchley
The relationship between brain and heart has been the subject of scientific and artistic discussion for centuries. Hugo Critchley, Professor of Psychiatry at Brighton and Sussex Medical School – a partnership between the Universities of Brighton and Sussex and the NHS – is pursuing research to understand such mind-body interactions. Recent work reveals how our hearts control our emotions: for example, our sensitivity to other people’s fear and shock is reduced just before, and increased just after, each heartbeat. Tracing how this occurs in the brain casts light on the heart’s role in thoughts and feelings, with implications for novel psychiatric treatments.
Michael Morris
We represent the real world in painting, sculpture and a variety of other art forms but, most fundamentally, in words. What is the relation between our representations and the reality they represent? What makes a representation a good representation? What contribution does the medium of representation make to the way in which representations represent, to what they are able to represent, and to what they reveal about reality? Through his rigorous exploration of these issues, Michael Morris, Professor of Philosophy at Sussex, seeks to illuminate the place and value of art and language in our understanding of the real world.
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Theodora Duka
Searching for reward can take control over the mind, becoming an addiction and distorting the ways we think and feel. There can be severe social and economic consequences for dependent individuals and their families, friends and work colleagues, as well as for health and social services. The research* of Theodora Duka, Professor of Experimental Psychology, aims to unravel the mysteries of addiction and to inform prevention and treatment. Her work, the result of an exciting collaborative, interdisciplinary project, focuses on the consequences of alcohol abuse for brain mechanisms that underlie emotions and decision-making, with the aim of improving patients’ ability to control their emotional and motivational impulses, so that they do not relapse following detoxification.
*funded by the Medical Research Council, the European Commission and the US National Institutes of Health
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Dennis Chan
Dementia represents the gravest challenge to healthcare delivery in the developed world. Earlier diagnosis is the key as disease-related changes can occur in the brain many years before the onset of dementia. Dr Dennis Chan, Senior Lecturer in Neurology at Brighton and Sussex Medical School – a partnership between the Universities of Brighton and Sussex and the NHS – aims to identify indicators of early Alzheimer’s disease, using MRI to identify changes in the function of the entorhinal cortex, the first part of the brain to be affected by Alzheimer’s, and in related brain networks. The focus is on improving early diagnosis of the disease and facilitating treatment trials delaying progression to dementia.
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Jennifer Rusted
Our memories define us – our past experiences and our future intentions. They colour our interactions with our environment and with others. While all of us can expect our memory to decline as we age, some of us may experience pathological change leading to dementia. Such changes are partly determined by our genes but partly by our physical and psychological fitness through the lifespan. Jennifer Rusted, Professor of Experimental Psychology, uniquely combines behavioural testing, brain imaging, neuropharmacology and genomics to understand the mechanisms that modulate memory in the ageing brain. Her research* is informing strategies to promote successful ageing and enhanced quality of later life.
*funded by the Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council, the Economic and Social Research Council, Sussex Partnership NHS Foundation Trust, the Ageing Research Centre Sussex and the Michael Chowen Fellowship
Anil Seth
Understanding the biological basis of conscious experience is one of the great challenges for 21st-century science, with important implications for diagnosis and treatment of many psychiatric and neurological disorders. Anil Seth, Reader in Informatics at Sussex and Co-Director of the Sackler Centre for Consciousness Science, is leading ground-breaking research* bringing together mathematicians, physicists, psychologists, philosophers, neuroscientists and clinicians in pursuit of this most fundamental question. Using new technologies such as augmented reality and high-performance computation to complement existing methods in brain imaging, the research casts new light on the processes underlying our awareness of the world and of our own selves.
*funded by the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council, the European Commission and the Dr Mortimer and Theresa Sackler Foundation
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Jamie Ward
Synaesthesia is a joining together of sensations that are normally experienced separately. For synaesthetes, music is seen as a kaleidoscope of shapes, words are tasted, or numbers are a coloured line gliding through space. Psychologist Dr Jamie Ward is one of the world’s leading experts on this fascinating condition. His research*, at the Sackler Centre for Consciousness Science, explores how differences in brain connectivity, such as those found in synaesthesia, can give rise to these unusual experiences, and how the brain may rewire itself as a result of sensory loss so that one sense may compensate for another (for instance, in blindness).
*funded by the Economic and Social Research Council and the Swiss National Science Foundation
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Gillian Bendelow
More than 25 per cent of primary-care patients in England have distressing conditions such as lower back pain or chronic fatigue that cannot be defined in terms of organic pathology, and pose huge challenges to practitioners. Gillian Bendelow, Professor of Medical Sociology, is researching experiences of chronic pain and other medically unexplained symptoms, frequently associated with anxiety and stress. Both patients and practitioners feel frustrated, as these ‘contested conditions’ are often not resolved by traditional biomedicine. Gillian is working with practitioners to develop treatment incorporating holistic approaches with effective psychosocial interventions to overcome the polarisation of mental/physical distinctions and reduce stigmatisation of these low-status conditions.