AzTrials
AzTrials

SchizophreniaNCT00004571

Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) of Neuropsychiatric Patients and Healthy Volunteers

An observational study of Schizophrenia and Normal Physiology, run by National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) at 1 site in United States.

Completed

Finished. The study has ended and is not enrolling. Results may be posted on the official record.

Official record
Search all trials

Trial summary

The purpose of this study is to use brain imaging technology to compare differences in brain structure, chemistry, and functioning in individuals with brain and mental disorders compared to healthy volunteers. Schizophrenia is a brain disorder that results from subtle changes and abnormalities in neurons. Read more about this study

Who is it for?
Ages 18 to 120 yearsHealthy volunteers can take part
Conditions the study is for
Schizophrenia, Normal Physiology
How many people
3,273 participants
Where
1 siteUnited States
Study dates
17 Feb 2000to not given
Phase
Observational
Are there results?
None posted in the registry

Key requirements

Who can take part, as listed by the sponsor. Only the study team can confirm whether you are eligible, so take this list to your doctor.

  • Ages 18 to 120 years
  • All sexes
  • Healthy volunteers accepted
  • Adult, Older adult

Study population: Patients with schizophrenia and healthy subjects from the community.

Who may be able to join

  • CONTROLS:
  • No psychiatric or severe chronic medical illness at the time of the study, and by history. This includes the absence of substance abuse histories, learning disabilities and all DSM IV disorders. The investigators will evaluate medical histories and medical conditions that are judged not to interfere with the study may be allowed.
  • No use of psychotropic substances in the last 3 months.
  • There is no upper age limit. The lower age limit is 18 years.
  • Controls will all have the capacity to consent.
  • PATIENTS:
Show all 12Show fewer
  • Schizophrenia, any subtype or schizo-affective disorder according to DSM IV .
  • Bipolar Disorder with Psychotic Features according to DSM IV.
  • Menstrually-Related Mood Disorder.
  • Mild to Moderate Parkinson's Disease (Hoehn and Yahr Stage 1-3).
  • Williams Syndrome (partial or full) with IQ in the normal range.
  • Patients with Multiple Sclerosis.

Who cannot join

  • CONTROLS AND PATIENTS:
  • Impaired hearing.
  • Pregnancy.
  • Head trauma with loss of consciousness in the last year, or any evidence of functional impairment due to and persisting after head trauma.
  • Patients or healthy volunteers with a known risk from exposure to high magnetic fields (e.g. patients with pace makers) and those who have metallic implants (e.g. braces) in the head region (likely to create artifact on the MRI scans) will be excluded from participating in the fMRI studies.
  • History of any (excepting nicotine-related) DSM5-defined moderate to severe substance use disorder (or DSM-IV-defined substance dependence).
Show all 14Show fewer
  • Cumulative lifetime history of any (excepting nicotine-related) DSM5-defined mild substance use disorder (or any DSM-IV-defined substance abuse), either in excess of 5 years total or not in remission for at least 6 months.
  • NIMH employees and staff and their immediate family members will be excluded from the study per NIMH policy.
  • Non-NIMH NIH employees and staff may participate and will be given the NIH Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) for NIH Staff Who are Considering Participation in NIH Research.
  • PATIENTS:
  • Coexistence of another major mental illness at the time of the study. If the patients experienced other mental illnesses in the past (e.g. a learning disability or major depression), then this should be judged to be fully recovered.
  • Major concurrent medical illness likely to interfere with the acquisition of the task.
  • Concomitant medications which could interfere with performance on the task.
  • Involuntary movements that interfere with positioning in the MRI scanner).

Trial locations and contacts

1 site in 1 country.

United States1 site
  • National Institutes of Health Clinical Center

    Bethesda, Maryland, 20892

Other trials in United States

About this study

Official title: Structural and Functional Imaging of Neuropsychiatric Patients and Normal Volunteers With 3.0 Tesla MRI and Magnetoencephalography

The purpose of this study is to use brain imaging technology to compare differences in brain structure, chemistry, and functioning in individuals with brain and mental disorders compared to healthy volunteers.

Schizophrenia is a brain disorder that results from subtle changes and abnormalities in neurons. These deficits likely occur in localized regions of the brain and may result in widespread, devastating consequences. The neuronal abnormalities are inherited through a complex combination of genetic and environmental factors. Brain imaging technologies can be used to better characterize brain changes in individuals with schizophrenia. This study will use magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) scans to identify predictable, quantifiable abnormalities in neurophysiology, neurochemistry and neuroanatomy that characterize schizophrenia and other neurological and neuropsychiatric disorders....

Read the detailed description

This protocol is meant to provide a matrix for multiple, simultaneous brain imaging investigations using magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) at 3.0 Tesla (3T). We intend to study regional brain structure, physiology, and biochemistry in living human subjects, both healthy and ill. Based on multiple clinical, neuropathological, and functional neuroimaging studies, it is clear that schizophrenia is a brain disorder arising from subtle neuronal deficits (for lack of more specific terminology). These deficits likely arise in a few key regions such as dorsolateral prefrontal cortex and hippocampal formation, that result in widespread, multifaceted, and devastating clinical consequences. These neuronal deficits are clearly heritable, although in a complex fashion from multiple genes interacting in an epistatic fashion with each other and the environment. We hypothesize that these neuronal deficits, clearly resulting in quantifiable behavioral abnormalities in schizophrenic patients, will produce predictable, quantifiable aberrations in neurophysiology that we can "map" using magnetic resonance imaging. In spite of numerous functional imaging findings, clinical applications remain scarce and pathognomonic findings absent. Therefore, we do not anticipate that an approach based solely on any one modality is likely to significantly advance our knowledge base. Instead, we propose to create brain imaging datasets for individual human subjects predicated on 1) the appraisal of brain function from multiple domains simultaneously; 2) the characterization of brain function via summation and intercorrelation of these data; and 3) the digestion of these data based on the parsing of complex clinical phenomenology into quantifiable neurophysiological parameters. Thus, in addition to the identification of those parameters that best characterize and identify manifest schizophrenia (i.e., state variables), we hypothesize that some of these fundamental characteristics will be heritable. These fundamental characteristics, so-called endo- or intermediate phenotypes, represent powerful tools to find susceptibility genes and have already generated a number of linkage findings.

Keywords
fMRI, MEG, Cognition, Magnetic Resonance Imaging, Schizophrenia, Natural History
Medical subject headings
Schizophrenia

What participants receive

What participants receive. In a randomised study each person is assigned to one group by chance.

Study groups in NCT00004571
Study groupRoleWhat they receive
Healthy volunteersHealthy subjects from the community
SchizophreniaPatients with schizophrenia and psychosis
Williams SyndromeIndividuals with copy number variation in the Williams Syndrome Region

What is being measured

The primary outcome is the main question the study is designed to answer.

  1. regional MRSI measures

    GABA and glutamate measurements in schizophrenia and healthy controls.

    Measured: spectroscopy

  2. magnetic field potentials

    Group differences in MEG signal for patients with schizophrenia and healthy subjects.

    Measured: MEG

  3. fMRI BOLD responses

    Group differences between patients with schizophrenia and healthy subjects, also genotyping used to characterize subjects as well.

    Measured: MRI study completion

  4. DTI anisotropy measures

    Compare fractional anisotropy and other measures of white matter connectivity for schizophrenic patients and controls.

    Measured: DTI

  5. brain volumetric measures

    VBM and cortical parcellation are used in schizophrenia and healthy controls.

    Measured: VBM

Secondary outcomes (1)
  1. neuropsychological task performance data

    Measured: NPT

Timeline

From the start of the study to its completion; the mark is today. Estimated dates are the sponsor’s plan.

  1. First posted16 Feb 2000 (estimated)
  2. Study start17 Feb 2000

Resources

More details

For doctors and researchers: how the study is designed, who runs it, and its registry IDs.

Study design
Study type
Observational
Observational model
Case-control
Time perspective
Cross-sectional
Enrolment
3,273 participants (actual)
IDs, dates and publications
ClinicalTrials.gov ID
NCT00004571
Sponsor's protocol ID
000085
Other IDs
00-M-0085
Status last verified
22 Jul 2026
First submitted
15 Feb 2000
Last updated
5 Nov 2026
Results posted
No
FDA-regulated drug
No
FDA-regulated device
No

Publications

  • Ianni AM, Eisenberg DP, Boorman ED, Constantino SM, Hegarty CE, Gregory MD, Masdeu JC, Kohn PD, Behrens TE, Berman KF. PET-measured human dopamine synthesis capacity and receptor availability predict trading rewards and time-costs during foraging. Nat Commun. 2023 Sep 30;14(1):6122. doi: 10.1038/s41467-023-41897-0.

    PubMed 37777515
  • Kippenhan JS, Gregory MD, Nash T, Kohn P, Mervis CB, Eisenberg DP, Garvey MH, Roe K, Morris CA, Kolachana B, Pani AM, Sorcher L, Berman KF. Dorsal visual stream and LIMK1: hemideletion, haplotype, and enduring effects in children with Williams syndrome. J Neurodev Disord. 2023 Aug 26;15(1):29. doi: 10.1186/s11689-023-09493-x.

    PubMed 37633900
  • Rubinstein DY, Eisenberg DP, Carver FW, Holroyd T, Apud JA, Coppola R, Berman KF. Spatiotemporal Alterations in Working Memory-Related Beta Band Neuromagnetic Activity of Patients With Schizophrenia On and Off Antipsychotic Medication: Investigation With MEG. Schizophr Bull. 2023 May 3;49(3):669-678. doi: 10.1093/schbul/sbac178.

    PubMed 36772948
  • Marenco S, Meyer C, van der Veen JW, Zhang Y, Kelly R, Shen J, Weinberger DR, Dickinson D, Berman KF. Role of gamma-amino-butyric acid in the dorsal anterior cingulate in age-associated changes in cognition. Neuropsychopharmacology. 2018 Oct;43(11):2285-2291. doi: 10.1038/s41386-018-0134-5. Epub 2018 Jul 3.

    PubMed 30050047
  • Jabbi M, Cropp B, Nash T, Kohn P, Kippenhan JS, Masdeu JC, Mattay R, Kolachana B, Berman KF. BDNF Val66Met polymorphism tunes frontolimbic circuitry during affective contextual learning. Neuroimage. 2017 Nov 15;162:373-383. doi: 10.1016/j.neuroimage.2017.08.080. Epub 2017 Sep 1.

    PubMed 28867340
  • Wei SM, Baller EB, Kohn PD, Kippenhan JS, Kolachana B, Soldin SJ, Rubinow DR, Schmidt PJ, Berman KF. Brain-derived neurotrophic factor Val66Met genotype and ovarian steroids interactively modulate working memory-related hippocampal function in women: a multimodal neuroimaging study. Mol Psychiatry. 2018 Apr;23(4):1066-1075. doi: 10.1038/mp.2017.72. Epub 2017 Apr 18.

    PubMed 28416813
  • Jabbi M, Chen Q, Turner N, Kohn P, White M, Kippenhan JS, Dickinson D, Kolachana B, Mattay V, Weinberger DR, Berman KF. Variation in the Williams syndrome GTF2I gene and anxiety proneness interactively affect prefrontal cortical response to aversive stimuli. Transl Psychiatry. 2015 Aug 18;5(8):e622. doi: 10.1038/tp.2015.98.

    PubMed 26285132
  • Jabbi M, Kohn PD, Nash T, Ianni A, Coutlee C, Holroyd T, Carver FW, Chen Q, Cropp B, Kippenhan JS, Robinson SE, Coppola R, Berman KF. Convergent BOLD and Beta-Band Activity in Superior Temporal Sulcus and Frontolimbic Circuitry Underpins Human Emotion Cognition. Cereb Cortex. 2015 Jul;25(7):1878-88. doi: 10.1093/cercor/bht427. Epub 2014 Jan 23.

    PubMed 24464944

Questions about this trial

What is this clinical trial studying?

An observational study of Schizophrenia and Normal Physiology, run by National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) at 1 site in United States.

The full registered description is in the About this study section and the official record.

Who may be eligible to take part?

The sponsor lists 12 inclusion and 14 exclusion criteria. Eligibility is decided by the study team after screening, so read the full criteria and contact a listed site.

Is this clinical trial currently recruiting?

The record says: finished, as of the sponsor's last update on 5 Nov 2026. Status can change between updates, so confirm with the study contact before making plans.

Where is the study taking place?

The record lists 1 site in United States. Whether a site is taking part right now should be confirmed with that site. See every site.

What are the possible benefits and risks?

They depend on the study and the treatment, and no study can promise a benefit. The study team explains the known risks during informed consent, before anyone joins; the record itself does not list them.

Are results available for this study?

The study is completed, but results are not available in the source record. That does not mean the treatment did or did not work.

How can a doctor refer a patient or contact the research team?

The record lists no contact. The official record names the sponsor, who can be asked directly. AzTrials does not enrol participants or take referrals.

What does the primary outcome measure?

regional MRSI measures (time frame: spectroscopy). The study lists 5 primary outcomes in all. It is what the study was designed to measure, not a finding.

Where can I read the original study information?

On the ClinicalTrials.gov record for NCT00004571, which also lists 8 linked publications.

Does a listing mean the treatment is approved or proven to work?

No. A listing means the study is registered. It does not show that the treatment is safe, works, or is approved by a regulator.

How often is this information updated?

AzTrials copies changed records from ClinicalTrials.gov every night and reloads the whole registry every week. The sponsor last updated this record on 5 Nov 2026; AzTrials last refreshed its copy on 8 Nov 2026.

Free account

Log in to keep searching

You’ve used your 3 free searches. AzTrials is free: log in or create a free account to keep searching clinical trials and save the ones you want to follow.

Create a free accountLog in