Dr James Kesby

Advanced Researcher
Developmental Neurobiology Research Stream

Lecturer
School of Biomedical Sciences, The University of Queensland

Completed PhD Student (Awarded 2010)
Queensland Centre for Mental Health Research

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Biography
Dr James Kesby's research interest lies in cognitive and decision-making problems associated with psychotic disorders like schizophrenia. These problems are a significant burden for these individuals and predict poor functional outcomes, such as maintaining work, social networks, and independent living. Dr Kesby is particularly interested in the relationship between decision-making problems and psychotic symptoms in these disorders; and creating new knowledge to understand if improving decision-making also reduce psychotic symptoms. To that end, James focuses on decision-making tasks that are reliant on brain areas and networks that are implicated in psychosis, and his work aims to understand how corticostriatal circuitry drives decision-making processes, and how this is altered in those with schizophrenia and psychosis.

Dr Kesby has taken advantage of collaborations with basic scientists and clinical researchers with a broad range of expertise to establish a cross-species program of research focussed on decision-making. His research is guided by two fundamental questions:

1. Do decision-making problems in schizophrenia and other psychotic disorders contribute to psychotic symptoms?
2. How can we leverage the mechanistic tools available in rodent neuroscience to identify causative common substrates underlying decision-making problems (and by proxy psychotic symptoms)?

PhD title
The effect of developmental vitamin D depletion on the dopaminergic system and behaviour in the rats

Supervisors
Prof Darryl Eyles and A/Prof Thomas Burne