BN significantly enhanced its Internet presence last week withthe unveiling of a redesigned and restructured web site.In addition to its streamlined navigation and crisp graphics,

the site features CBN’s ubiquitous brain art graphic and rotating imagesof research and education programs. The site is divided into a public“brochure site” at www.cbn-atl.org and a private web services site atwww.my-cbn.org for members of the CBN community. Features of theprivate site include private individual calendars, online forums for dis-cussions about behavioral neuroscience, and an archive of streamingmedia presentations of lectures and symposia. A library of CBN docu-ments, such as meeting minutes and reports, also is available on the webservices site. To access www.my-cbn.org, contact Rob Poh, director ofinformation technology, via e-mail at rpoh@gsu.edu.

The organization and content of the new web site are based onextensive interviews conducted by Poh with the CBN management teamand collaboratory heads. The look and feel of the site also are alignedwith CBN’s visual identity.

Additional content and features will be added to the public andprivate sites over the coming months, including a new standardizedsystem for measuring and identifying animal behaviors.n

Mook, DVM, CBN graduate studentsJennifer Felger and Franklynn Graves,and Kim Wallen, PhD, Dobbs Professorof Psychology and reproduction collabo-ratory head, compared the behavior offour groups of adult female rhesusmacaques that were not producing estro-gen. The groups were divided into aplacebo group; a group that receivedestradiol, a natural estrogen; a tamoxifengroup; and a tamoxifen-plus-estradiolgroup.

After a three-week period, theresearchers observed rates of anxiety-likebehaviors were significantly higher in thetamoxifen and tamoxifen-plus-estradiolgroups compared with females receivingestradiol only

“Tamoxifen not only appears toantagonize estrogen’s anxiety-reducingeffect, but also to increase anxiety-likebehavior by itself, in the absence of estro-gen,” said Wilson. “While tamoxifen isan extremely effective anti-cancer med-

ication, women may stop taking itbecause of its negative effects on behav-ior and emotion.”

In other tests, Wilson and his col-leagues measured serotonin activity, amarker for depression in humans, in theanimals’ brains to determine if tamoxifenaffected it. As expected, the researchersfound estradiol increased serotonin activ-ity in the monkeys. In both the tamoxifenand the tamoxifen-plus-estradiol groups,however, serotonin activity was unaffect-ed compared to placebo treated controls.“We expected tamoxifen would reduceserotonin activity because of its attenuat-ing effects on estradiol,” said Wilson.“Our findings suggest, however, tamox-ifen must be producing its negativebehavioral effects through its action on adifferent neurotransmitter involved inmood.”

Wilson and his colleagues’ latestfinding about tamoxifen adds to a grow-ing body of evidence about the drug’snegative behavioral effects. In a previousstudy, Wilson and his colleagues found

tamoxifen inhibits sexual behavior infemale rhesus macaques.

In conjunction with a team of inves-tigators from the Department ofPsychiatry and Behavioral Sciences andthe Winship Cancer Institute at EmoryUniversity School of Medicine, Wilsoncurrently is examining the interactionbetween tamoxifen and a commonly pre-scribed class of anti-depressionmedications—selective serotonin reup-take inhibitors (SSRIs). The 12-monthstudy is following two groups of rhesusmacaques, a tamoxifen-only group and atamoxifen-plus-SSRI group, to determinewhether SSRIs diminish anxiety behav-iors. The study will determine whetherSSRIs reduce anxiety-like behaviors intamoxifen-treated monkeys and whetherthey change the metabolism of tamoxifenthereby reducing its biological activity.Although SSRIs may relieve symptoms ofanxiety, they also could reduce the effica-cy of tamoxifen against breast cancer.Such findings will be critical informationfor clinicians.n

AROUND CBN

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Synapse Spring 2005Vol. 6, No. 2

News? Story Ideas? We want to know! Call us at 404.463.9433or e-mail polson@gsu.edu

Editor: Poul E. Olson

A quarterly publication of the CENTER FOR BEHAVIORAL NEUROSCIENCES P R I N G 2 0 0 5

A NATIONAL SCIENCE FOUNDATION SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY CENTER n GEORGIA STATE UNIVERSITY n EMORY UNIVERSITY n SPELMAN COLLEGE n MOREHOUSE COLLEGE n MOREHOUSE SCHOOL OF MEDIC INE n CLARK ATLANTA UNIVERSITY n MORRIS BROWN COLLEGE n GEORGIA INST ITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY

Neuroscience Expo Touches Thousands of AtlantansBreast Cancer DrugTamoxifen Increases AnxietyBehaviors in Monkeys

What’s insideDIRECTOR ’S CORNER 2

A Turning Point?EDUCAT ION 3

Neuroscience Expo HighlightsNEWS 4

Redesigned Web Site UnveiledSynapse

Tamoxifen Increases Anxiety Behaviors in Rhesus MacaquesContinued from page 1

amoxifen, the most widely prescribeddrug for treating and preventing breastcancer in women, increases anxiety

behaviors in female rhesus macaques, according toa study conducted at the Yerkes National PrimateResearch Center of Emory by Yerkes, EmoryUniversity and CBN researchers. The researcherscaution the extent of the side effects could hindercompliance in women using the popular medica-tion. The study is reported in the April edition ofPsychoneuroendocrinology.

While studies have shown tamoxifen signifi-cantly improves survival rates forwomen with breast cancer byblocking the effects of estrogen,clinical evidence suggests the drugincreases rates of anxiety and theincidence of hot flashes, both ofwhich may result from reducedaction of estrogen. To determine iftamoxifen had these behavioraleffects in both the presence andabsence of estrogen, Mark Wilson,PhD, chief of the Yerkes Division ofPsychobiology and a member ofCBN’s reproduction collaboratory,and his colleagues, Deborah

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Redesigned Web Site UnveiledStreamlined navigation, video archive among new features

pringtime in Atlanta has manytraditions: Braves preseason, theDogwood Festival, Screen on the

Green in Piedmont Park. Add to that listCBN’s annual Brains Rule! NeuroscienceExposition.

In partnership with Zoo Atlanta,CBN touched more than 4,600 Atlantansduring the March 18-19 expo, the largestpublic education event of its type in thecountry held during Brain AwarenessMonth (BAM).

On March 18, some 100 seventh-

graders from Atlanta Public School’sCharles Drew Charter School, a CBNeducation partner, visited the expo andlearned about the brain through interac-tive booths on a range of topics from ionchannels to snake venom.

“Charles Drew teachers told us thiswas their students’ favorite field trip of

the year,” said CBN educator and expodirector Kyle Frantz, PhD.

During the March 19 public event,which coincided with Girl Scout Day atthe zoo, the public encountered some 35booths located near animal exhibitsaround the park. Several booths, mostnotably “Brain Art,” were inundatedwith visitors the entire day. More than400 people completed “sticker cards”after visiting eight booths and earned theopportunity to spin a prize wheel.

“The zoo was a terrific venue for theexpo,” said Frantz. “Volunteers and visi-tors alike had fun teaching and learningabout neuroscience on-site with the ani-mal exhibits.”

Frantz credited the expo’s success tothe enthusiasm and passion of the morethan 200 volunteers, including highschool students, undergraduates, gradu-ate students and professional scientists,to inspire the Charles Drew students’ andthe public’s interest in neuroscience. (Seephoto highlights on pg. 3.)

In addition to the expo, CBN’s otherBAM events included a March 21 screen-ing at the Fernbank Museum of NaturalHistory of the hit amnesia movieMemento followed by a lecture titled“How We Remember, Why We Forget,”led by Stuart Zola, PhD, co-director forknowledge transfer. During March, CBNalso worked with the Atlanta Chapter ofthe Society for Neuroscience to provideneuroscientists as speakers to 29 metroAtlanta schools. Since 2003, the numberof school visits by Atlanta neuroscientistsduring BAM has more than tripled. n

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John Redmond, PhD, (right), co-chair of CBN’s precollege education commit-tee, shows seventh-grade students from Charles Drew Charter School a realhuman brain at the neuroscience exposition.

The redesigned web site features streamlined navigation, rotating images ofCBN research and education programs, and a video archive of lectures andsymposia.

Continued on page 4

Brain Awareness Month event is largest of its type in the country

2 C E N T E R F O R B E H AV I O R A L N E U RO S C I E N C E

DIRECTOR ’S CORNER

ATurning Point for the Research Program?ince its inception, CBN has made significant progressin meeting its initial objectives for understanding theneurobiology of affiliation, aggression, fear and repro-

duction. Last year, we began discussions about bringingtogether the collaboratories around common research areas.The cross-collaboratory initiative will be formally consideredat this year’s May 7 faculty retreat. Some research areas ofparticular interest are social memory/social cognition, sex dif-ferences and reward/reinforcement. We also plan to discusswhether CBN’s collaborative approaches may provide aunique opportunity to investigate the mechanisms that allownodal points in the nervous system to regulate a wide variety of functions.

CBN has distinguished itself among the neuroscience community for demonstrat-ing how “big science” can be accomplished through interdisciplinary,interinstitutional collaboration. As we chart our future over the next several years, weare faced with the opportunity to further develop our innovative research program.This year’s retreat should mark an important turning pointfor the center. I encourage you all to participate.n

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Albers

Synapse n SPRING 2005 3

EDUCAT ION

n recognition of his distinguished career in memory and cogni-tion research, and for his contribution to the patient caremission of the Atlanta Veterans Affairs (VA) Medical Center,

Stuart Zola, PhD, director of Emory’s Yerkes National PrimateResearch Center, a VA senior research career scientist and CBNco-director for knowledge transfer, recently received the 2004Henry M. Middleton Research Excellence Award of Atlanta. Theaward is given to the researcher whose body of work has had the greatest impact onthe Atlanta VA Medical Center during the year.n

Zola Receives Atlanta VA Excellence Award

IZola

Brains Rule! Neuroscience Expo2005 Highlights

At left, an awe-struck youngster watches hopefullyas the prize wheel spins; above, CBN graduatescholar Megan Dailey (right) demonstrates how anti-venom counteracts the effects of a snake bite.

Sea Snails Use Chemical Warfare Against Predators

Jordan Rose of the Emory Centerfor Science Education demonstratesthe neurobiology of juggling.

An enthralled, but apprehensivefamily learns about “crabbybehavior” at the Institute forBiomedical Philosophy booth.

In an exhibit called “The IncredibleEdible Neuron,” expo visitors createdneurons and their constituent partsfrom various cookie ingredients.

A Girl Scout (left) and her sister learnabout different parts of the brainthrough a coloring activity at the popu-lar “Brain Art” booth.

Photos by Poul E. Olson

Brains Rule! director Kyle Frantz, PhD,(center) watches a magic show led byStuart Zola, PhD, co-director forknowledge transfer.

team of CBN scientists at Georgia State University has found that Aplysia,common marine snails or sea slugs, repel predators with chemicals that act onthe nervous system to cause sensory disruption. The finding, which was pub-

lished in the March 29 issue of Current Biology, represents the first evidence of marineanimals using sensory disruption as a mechanism of antipredatory chemical defense.

When attacked by predatory spiny lobsters, sea slugs release purple clouds con-taining ink and a sticky white substance called opaline. The CBN team, includingpost-doctoral fellow Cynthia Kicklighter, PhD, CBN graduate scholar Zeni Shabani,Paul Johnson, PhD, and aggression collaboratory member Charles Derby, PhD, foundthe secretions contain a variety of chemicals that attack the lobster nervous system.These chemicals, which include compounds also found in the lobsters’ food, activatepathways that control feeding behaviors, as well as others involved in grooming andavoidance. As a result, the lobsters become confused and distracted, enabling theslugs to escape.

Because chemicals in the slugs’ secretions stimulate feeding behaviors in the lob-sters, the researchers named the effect phagomimicry or “fake food.” They alsospeculated the long-lasting effects of the secretions appear to result from their pro-longed stickiness, despite the aqueous environment.n

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Albers Shares Insightswith Developing NSFResearch Centers

eveloping a successful science andeducation research center requireseffective communication and the par-

ticipation of all faculty members. That was one ofthe messages that CBN director Elliott Albers, PhD,brought to the Jan. 28 inaugural meeting of theNational Science Foundation’s Science of LearningCenters (SLCs).

Last summer, NSF established the SLC pro-gram with $36.5 million in grants to four centersbased at Boston University (BU), Carnegie MellonUniversity, Dartmouth College and the Universityof Washington (UW). The overall program willexamine the concept of learning from an interdis-ciplinary standpoint with the goals of developingimproved educational methods of learning andbuilding machines that can perform tasks intelli-gently and independently.

At the meeting, Albers shared his adminis-trative and management experiences runningCBN. Albers reported there is considerable interestin developing research and education collabora-tions between CBN and the new centers.

The SLCs include the BU Center forExcellence for Learning in Education, Science andTechnology, which will study and model thebehavioral and brain processes involved in learn-ing; the Pittsburgh Science of Learning Center atCarnegie Mellon, which will explore robust learn-ing or learning that lasts a long period of time; theCenter for Cognitive and Educational Neuroscienceat Dartmouth College, which will investigate thebrain mechanisms of learning; and the UW Centerfor Learning in Informal and FormalEnvironments, which will guide the developmentof educational practices based on a better under-standing of the neural processes and principles oflearning in different environments.n

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