Jonathan D Morrow

Jonathan Morrow, M.D., Ph.D. received his B.S. in Biological Sciences from the University of Southern California, and his M.D. and Ph.D. in Neuroscience from the University of Michigan. His graduate studies focused on the relationship between sleep and the immune system. Specifically, Dr. Morrow used rodent models to show that interleukin-6 does not directly increase or decrease non-REM sleep the way other cytokines had been previously shown to do; rather it disrupts the circadian timing of non-REM sleep to allow sleep and wakefulness at unorthodox time periods in response to homeostatic challenges. Dr. Morrow went on to complete his residency training in Adult Psychiatry at the University of Michigan, and subsequently became certified in Addiction Medicine.
Dr. Morrow joined the faculty of the University of Michigan as an Assistant Professor of Psychiatry in 2011. He provides medication management and other clinical care to patients through the University of Michigan Addiction Treatment Services. His clinical interests include the treatment of co-occurring psychiatric disorders such as addiction and post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).
Dr. Morrow's primary research interest is in delineating the basic neurobiology that underlies motivated behavior, and determining how variation in that neurobiology can lead to psychopathology. Dr. Morrow employs a behavioral procedure in animals known as the Pavlovian conditioned approach (PCA) in combination with fear conditioning techniques to identify vulnerability factors that may be common to both addiction and PTSD, an increasingly prevalent comorbidity that is often recalcitrant to current treatments. The Morrow lab uses behavioral, pharmacological, immunohistochemical, and neurosurgical techniques in rodents to identify and manipulate specific neural circuits that show individual differences relevant to multiple psychiatric disorders. Findings suggest that individual differences in functional connectivity within the limbic system, particularly involving the mesoaccumbens system, may affect vulnerability to a large number of psychiatric disorders, including both addiction and PTSD. In addition to ongoing rodent experiments, Dr. Morrow is working to adapt the PCA model for screening human subjects so that potential treatments and preventative strategies identified through these techniques can be tested in both humans and animals.

Clinical Interests:
Dual diagnosis
Psychiatric comorbidity
Substance use disorders

Research Interests:
Neurobiology of addiction
Neurobiology of goal-directed behavior
Neurobiology of vulnerability to comorbid psychiatric disorders