A U of T Scarborough researcher has received a prestigious grant for her project on fear memory generalization.
Maithe Arruda-Carvalho, an assistant professor in the Department of Psychology, will receive $350,000 (USD) over three years as a winner of the Young Investigator Grant from the Human Frontier Science Program. The grant program funds research projects by scientists collaborating across borders.
The project is an international collaboration with two researchers, Benjamin Grewe, who is in Switzerland, and Mazen Kheirbeck, in the U.S. The trio are studying generalization in fear memories across scales, from synapses in the brain all the way to behaviour.
“This is an incredible opportunity to start this collaboration with a fantastic international team, allowing us to ask fascinating questions about how fear memories generalize,” Arruda-Carvalho says.
In uncovering how fear memories generalize, this research has critical implications for psychological disorders, such as post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).
“By joining forces, our three labs will examine fear generalization from the neural network, cellular and synaptic levels at the same time.