Burak Baktir Rose Hills
Chemogenetic Dissection of Cardiac Interoception in Fear Behavior
Anxiety and fear disorders affect nearly 300 million people worldwide, yet we still don’t fully understand what drives them. While most research focuses on the brain, the body may play a bigger role than we think. When we’re scared, our heart races but could the state of our heart actually be shaping how afraid we feel in the first place? This project investigates whether heart rate causally influences fear and anxiety by manipulating cardiac activity in mice. Using a chemogenetic tool called DREADDs, I can selectively slow the heart rate of mice without touching their brain circuits, allowing me to isolate the heart’s contribution to behavior. I will then measure how these mice respond to threatening stimuli across a range of behavioral tests and record their brain activity to identify which neurons are responding to signals from the heart. If slowing the heart reduces fear responses, it would suggest that the body isn’t just reacting to fear, it may actually be driving it. These findings could help explain why practices like slow breathing and heart rate biofeedback reduce anxiety in patients, and may open new directions for treating anxiety disorders and PTSD
Message To Sponsor
I am deeply grateful for your support of my research this summer. As someone who hopes to become a cardiologist one day, the opportunity to investigate how the heart influences brain states and defensive behavior feels deeply personal to my future path. Your generosity makes it possible for me to develop real skills in the lab, contribute to science that may one day help millions of people and grow as a researcher.