The research area in psychiatry should cover biological, psychological, social and ethical aspects of human behaviors. The Department of Psychiatry, Osaka University Graduate School of Medicine, traditionally covers most of the important areas of psychiatry. The Department has six research groups. Neurochemical research is actively tackled by Neurochemistry & Psychopharmacology group, in which molecular pathogenesis, risk gene, biomarker drug development of Alzheimer’s disease is the most important research topics. Physiological research is covered by Cognitive Behavioral Physiology group, in which EEG, MEG, NIRS and other new techniques are introduced to understand symptomatology of epilepsy, schizophrenia, and other important psychiatric disorders. Sleep EEG group is actively studying PSG of sleep disorders including narcolepsy, sleep apnea, and rhythym disorders. Psychological area is covered by Neuropsychology group, which is now studying clinical psychology of dementia, clinical evaluation of iNPH, aiming for the elucidation of the mechanism of memory, and cognition. Psychopathology group covers the area of child psychiatry, adolescent psychiatry, especially in eating disorders. Schizophrenia research group is working on the important topics of schizophrenia integration, clinical data, endophenotype, genetics, physiological data and data from cell biology.
The Department is trying to integrate the results of various research activities into the final goal to elucidate the underlying mechanism of mental disorders. In other words, it is essential for the promotion of brain science to integrate all available research facilities to understand the mechanism of the brain function. The target disorders are dementia, schizophrenia, mood disorders, anxiety disorders and others. The Department is open for communication and human exchange for the promotion of psychiatric research activity.
