Until his retirement in early 2010, Dr. Mirko Diksic studied the regulation of serotonin production in various regions of the brain, using experimental animals as well as human subjects. His work suggests that serotonin synthesis is variously controlled in different brain structures. He has studied fluoxetine (Prozac), fluvoxamine, and p-chlorophenylalanine, as well as Ecstasy, a drug that dramatically increases serotonin synthesis. Dr. Diksic has found large differences in serotonin synthesis in men and women that might contribute to a higher incidence of depression among women. He synthesized radioactive-labelled compounds that enable researchers to study the monoaminergic and GABAergic systems in the living brain. With Dr. Pedro Rosa-Neto, he studied the GABAergic system in laboratory animals. He also studied serotonin synthesis with respect to epilepsy. In collaboration with Drs. Edith Hamel and Michael Aube at the MNI, Dr. Diksic studied serotonin synthesis with regard to migraines and their treatment. He also evaluated serotonin synthesis control in normal rats and rat models of depression.

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E-mail: Mirko Diksic