Maura Boldrini, M.D., Ph.D., is Associate Professor of Clinical Neurobiology in the Department of Psychiatry at Columbia University College of Physicians & Surgeons.
Research Focus
Dr. Maura Boldrini has extensive experience in postmortem human brain studies. She has worked with Dr. Arango and Dr. Mann since 1998. In the Conte Center, Dr. Boldrini has proposed to assess, in the brain of depressed suicides and non suicides and subjects without psychopathology, the relationship between history of childhood adversity (separation or abuse), levels of serotonin 1A receptors and brain derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF) – both affecting neuroplasticity – and the total number of neurons in the hippocampal subfields. The project aims to distinguish the effect of psychopathology from that of adversity. The inclusion of a group with no psychopathology but history of adversity allows studying the morphological, genetic and epigenetic characteristics of a resilient phenotype. She will coordinate gathering the psychological autopsy and the genetics data of the cases studied, in order to perform data analysis regarding the gene x environment interactions affecting the target biological phenotype in the hippocampus.
Dr. Boldrini is a pioneer in detecting and measuring adult neurogenesis in postmortem human hippocampus. She has been studying adult hippocampal neurogenesis in the human brain since 2006, assessing how it is affected by antidepressants treatment, psychopathology and aging. The hippocampus is a brain region known to be involved in stress responses and whose structural plasticity is affected by stress exposure. Dr. Boldrini is interested in studying the relationship between childhood adversity and neuroplasticity in the hippocampus, and the effect of genetic and epigenetic factors on it.
Previously Dr. Boldrini focused her studies on neurobiological changes associated with suicide and mood disorders at the level of the brainstem. She studied serotonin 1A receptor, tryptophan hydroxylases and serotonin transporter detecting alterations of their expression at the regional and cellular level and mapping their distribution along the rostro-caudal axis of the raphe nucleus in depression and suicide.
Her clinical research has included neuropsychological, genetic and psychopathology studies.
Dr. Boldrini’s research in mood disorders and suicide has been continuously funded by private foundations, New York State and NIH since 1999. She has been the PI of several grants studying the neurobiology of neuropsychiatric diseases in postmortem human brain. She is currently the PI of an NIMH R01 entitled “Adult hippocampal neuroplasticity and depression”, an American Foundation for Suicide Prevention (AFSP) Standard Investigator Award entitled “Hippocampal neurogenesis in suicide”, a Brain & Behavior Research Foundation (BBRF, formerly NARSAD) Independent Investigator Grant entitled “Inflammatory cytokines and hippocampal neuroplasticity in mood disorders”, and a NINDS U01 subcontract entitled “Sudden Unexpected Death in Epilepsy (SUDEP) Translational Research Alliance (SUTRA); The Neuropathology of SUDEP: The Central Autonomic Network, Serotonin, and Adenosine”; she is co-investigator in a NYSTEM Imaging Core Facility grant entitled “Imaging Stem Cells in the Brain for Studying Neuropsychiatric Disorders”.
Select Publications
1. Toni C, Boldrini M, Frare F, Medda PP. Neuropsychology of mood disorders. In: Cassano GB, Pancheri P, Pavan L, Pazzagli A, Ravizza L, Rossi R, Smeraldi E, Volterra V (Ed.), Trattato Italiano di Psichiatria, Second Edition, Masson, Milan, Italy, 1999
2. Boldrini M, Placidi GF. Italian Translation of: David Nutt, Spilios Argyropoulos, Sean Hood (Ed.), Clinical manual: Comorbidity between anxiety disorders and depression. Science Press Ltd, London, 2001
3. Arango V, Underwood MD, Boldrini M, Tamir H, Kassir SA, Hsiung SC, Chen JJX, Mann JJ: Serotonin 1A receptors, serotonin transporter binding and serotonin transporter mRNA expression are reduced in the brainstem of depressed suicide victims. Neuropsychopharmacology 2001; 25(6):892-903
4. Boldrini M. New atypical antipsychotics: integration between pharmacotherapy and psychosocial therapy. In: Quetiapine in clinical practice. AstraZeneca (Ed.). Il Pensiero Scientifico Editore, Rome, Italy, 2002
5. Boldrini M, Underwood MD, Mann JJ, Arango V: More tryptophan hydroxylase in the brainstem dorsal raphe nucleus in depressed suicides. Brain Res 2005; Apr 11;1041(1):19-28
6. Boldrini M, Underwood MD, Mann JJ, Arango V. Serotonin-1A autoreceptor binding in the dorsal raphe nucleus of depressed suicides. J Psychiatr Res 2008; May;42(6):433-442
7. Boldrini M, Underwood MD, Hen R, Rosoklija GB, Dwork AJ, Mann JJ, Arango V. Antidepressants increase neural progenitor cells in the human hippocampus. Neuropsychopharmacology 2009; 34(11):2376-2389 e-Pub ahead of print. PM:19606083
8. Boldrini M, Arango V. Antidepressants, age and neuroprogenitors. Neuropsychopharmacology. 2010 Jan;35(1):351-352. doi: 10.1038/npp.2009.130
9. Boldrini M, Underwood MD, Mann JJ, Arango V. Serotonin-1A autoreceptor binding in the dorsal raphe nucleus of depressed suicides. [Unión al autorreceptor 5-HT1A de la serotonina en el núcleo dorsal del rafe en muestras de tejido de víctimas de suicidio deprimidas]. Psiquiatria Biologica. Volume 17, Issue 1, January 2010, Pages 12-21
10. Boldrini M, Arango V. Consequences of the Stress Response: Stress and suicide. In: L.R. Squire (Ed.) New Encyclopedia of Neuroscience, Elsevier, Oxford, UK. 2010, Pages 471-479
11. Boldrini M, Hen R, Underwood MD, Rosoklija GB, Dwork AJ, Mann JJ, Arango V. Hippocampal Angiogenesis and Progenitor Cell Proliferation are Increased with Antidepressant Use in Major Depression. Biol Psychiatry. 2012 Oct 1;72(7):562-571.
12. Boldrini M, Santiago AN, Hen R, Dwork AJ, Rosoklija GB, Tamir H, Arango V Mann JJ. Hippocampal granule neuron number and dentate gyrus volume in antidepressant-treated and untreated major depression. Neuropsychopharmacology. 2013 Jan 7. doi: 10.1038/npp.2013.
13. Mann JJ, Oquendo MA, Watson KT, Boldrini M, Malone KM, Ellis SP, Sullivan G, Cooper TB, Xie S, Currier D. Anxiety in Major Depression and Cerebrospinal Fluid Free Gamma-Aminobutyric Acid. Depression and Anxiety. Depress Anxiety. 2014 May 27. doi: 10.1002/da.22278.
14. Boldrini M, Butt TH, Dwork AJ, Bakalian MJ, Tamir H, Rosoklija GB, Hen R, Arango V Mann JJ. Benzodiazepines And The Potential Trophic Effect Of Antidepressants On Dentate Gyrus Cells In Mood Disorders. Int J Neuropsychopharmacol 2014 Jun 27:1-11.
15. Boldrini M, Mann JJ. Depression and Suicide. In: Michael J. Zigmond, Joseph T. Coyle and Lewis P (Ed.), Neurobiology of Brain Disorders; Biological Basis of Neurological and Psychiatric Disorders. First Edition. Edited by Rowland. Elsevier, San Diego, CA, USA, 2014