- Rajendra D Badgaiyan: Department of Psychiatry, University at Buffalo, Buffalo, NY, USA. rbrb@buffalo.edu
As the role of dopamine in human emotional processing is unclear, we used a dynamic molecular imaging technique to examine whether striatal dopamine is released during processing of negative emotions in healthy volunteers. After volunteers have received an intravenous injection of a dopamine receptor ligand C-raclopride, they were asked to perform a task that elicited negative emotions. During task performance the ligand concentration was measured dynamically using a positron emission tomography camera. Analysis of the data indicated that the task performance is associated with dopamine release in the head of caudate and in the dorsal putamen bilaterally.