Dr Faya Tashakori Sabzevar
| Position | Postdoctoral Fellow |
|---|---|
| Department | Department of Pharmacology and Toxicology |
| Qualifications | B.SC (IAUM), M.SC (NAS RA), PhD (Otago) |
| Research summary | Vestibular and Auditory Neuroscience, Neurobiology of motivation, cognition, and their interaction, Spatial memory and navigation |
Research
My research area of interest is in the vestibular and auditory systems and how galvanic vestibular stimulation (GVS) or noisy GVS (a variant of GVS) affect the rat brain, the striatum, in particular.
In general, GVS is the process of delivering specific electrical signals to the vestibular nerve in the ear that maintains balance. GVS and recently noisy GVS (nGVS) have been reported to be useful in treating Parkinson's disease (PD) and other neurological and psychiatric diseases. However, how GVS and nGVS act on the brain is poorly understood. Therefore, my current project aims to investigate the effects of GVS and nGVS on electrophysiological responses and neurochemical release in the striatum. To date, no previous study has fulfilled these objectives. Therefore, the research is highly novel.
The results will provide a clearer understanding of how GVS and nGVS could be useful for treating Parkinson's disease and other neurological disorders.
Publications
Tashakori-Sabzevar, F., Vautrelle, N., Zheng, Y., & Smith, P. F. (2023). Vestibular modulation of the tail of the rat striatum. Scientific Reports, 13, 4443. doi: 10.1038/s41598-023-31289-1
Scott, K. J., Tashakori-Sabzevar, F., & Bilkey, D. K. (2021). Maternal immune activation alters the sequential structure of ultrasonic communications in male rats. Brain, Behavior & Immunity: Health, 16, 100304. doi: 10.1016/j.bbih.2021.100304
Tashakori-Sabzevar, F., & Ward, R. D. (2018). Basal forebrain mediates motivational recruitment of attention by reward-related cues. Frontiers in Neuroscience, 12, 786. doi: 10.3389/fnins.2018.00786
