College of Medicine

In March 2019, Dr. Pascal Jean-Pierre of the Florida State University (FSU) College of Medicine, Department of Behavioral Sciences and Social Medicine received $48,000 from the FSU MRI Oversight Committee for his project, MRI/fMRI support for study on inflammatory agent to mitigate brain and cognitive impairments in type 2 diabetes. This two-year award allows Dr. Jean-Pierre to conduct research on FSU's Siemens Prisma 3 Tesla Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) system. In May 2019, the FSU Council on Research and Creativity awarded a one-year $13,000 Planning Grant for a Food and Drug Administration-approved open-label trial of an inflammatory agent to reduce systemic inflammation and mitigate neurocognitive dysfunction in individuals with type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM). 

"The CRC grant represents a novel and timely approach to characterize and treat T2DM-related impairments in brain structures and neurocognitive functioning for individuals with T2DM, especially those from medically underserved racial-ethnic minorities, geographically isolated rural areas and lower socioeconomic populations," said Dr. Jean-Pierre. Dr. Jean-Pierre and his research team hypothesize that T2DM-related neurocognitive dysfunction (T2DM-ND) is multifaceted and that inflammation is implicated in the development and clinical course of this debilitating condition. In this study, Dr. Jean-Pierre and his team will examine the benefits of using an anti-inflammatory drug to help reduce neuroinflammation and improve cognitive performance for individuals with T2DM-ND. A novel multimodal integrative assessment paradigm will be applied to better characterize T2DM-ND and inform the development and testing of interventions to treat this adverse condition.

Data from this study will support future competitive grant proposals (e.g., NIH R01) to the National Institutes of Health National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive Kidney Diseases (NIDDK), National Institute of Aging (NIA) and other funding agencies.