Division of Psychiatry Division of Psychiatry
Key researchers

Dr Heather Whalley

Heather Whalley is a research fellow at the Division of Psychiatry.

Heather Whalley
  • Heather Whalley
  • Research Fellow
  • Division of Psychiatry
Email:

She has a neuroscience background and currently holds a Royal Society Dorothy Hodgkin fellowship.

Background

Dr Whalley graduated in neuroscience at the University of Edinburgh, and subsequently completed an MSc by research (distinction awarded) along with her PhD in the field of neuroimaging at the Division of Psychiatry.

Research interests

Heather’s main area of research interest and expertise is in the use of magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) to investigate underlying mechanisms of neuropsychiatric disorders. In particular, she has been involved in two large cohort studies examining the neural correlates of inheritance of schizophrenia and bipolar disorder.

Her main focus has been on the analysis of functional MRI scans in order to examine the neural correlates of inheritance of the disorders and of psychotic and affective symptomatology. This work has also involved examining functional connectivity in relation to inherited vulnerability and the presence of symptoms, exploring longitudinal functional changes over time in relation to fluctuating symptomatology, and issues relating to reproducibility of the technique.

She has also been conducting research on possible functional predictors of conversion to the full disorders and has examined the effects of susceptibility genes for schizophrenia and bipolar disorder on brain function in genetic high risk subjects and healthy controls.

The subject of her current fellowship is to examine whether there are common and/or different neurobiological mechanisms contributing to these disorders, specifically whether there are associations with common risk genes or common symptoms across the disorders.

Selected publications

The neural basis of familial risk and temperamental variation in individuals at high risk of bipolar disorder
In press at Biol Psych 2011
Whalley HC, Sussmann JE, Chakirova G, Mukerjee P, Peel A, McKirdy J, Hall J Johnstone EC, Lawrie SM, McIntosh AM
Effects of the BDNF val66met polymorphism on prefrontal brain function in a population at high genetic risk of schizophrenia
Am J Med Genetics Part B Neurospychiatric Genetics 2010, 153B(8):1474-1482
Whalley HC, Baig BJ, Hall J, Job DE, McIntosh AM, Cunningham_Owens DG, Johnstone EC, Lawrie SM
Functional imaging of emotional memory in bipolar disorder and schizophrenia
Bip Disorders 2009, 11:8:840-856
Whalley HC, McKirdy J, Romaniuk L, Sussmann J, Johnstone EC, Wan HI, McIntosh AM, Lawrie SM, Hall J
A GRIK4 variant conferring protection against bipolar disorder modulates hippocampal function
Mol Psychiatry. 2009,14(5):467-8
Whalley HC, Pickard BS, McIntosh AM, Zuliani R, Johnstone EC, Blackwood DH, Lawrie SM, Muir WJ, Hall J
fMRI changes over time and reproducibility in un-medicated subjects at high genetic risk of schizophrenia
Psych Med 2009, 39(7):1189-1199
Whalley HC, Gountouna VE, Hall J, McIntosh AM, Simonotto E, Job DE, Owens DGC, Johnstone EC, Lawrie SM
Hypofrontality in subjects at high genetic risk of schizophrenia with depressive symptoms
J Affective Disorders, 109;99-106, 2008
Whalley HC, Mowatt L, Stanfield AC, Hall J, Johnstone EC, Lawie SM, McIntosh AM

This article was published on Oct 5, 2011


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