University of Minnesota

Substance abuse affects 24 million Americans, and the goals of controlling chronic pain without causing addiction and preventing relapse have proved elusive. The University of Minnesota is identifying the root causes of relapse and creating better painkillers to end addiction. “One of the things we were interested in is: how does the brain recover when people stop using drugs?” says Kelvin Lim, professor of psychiatry at the University of Minnesota. Learning to predict who has the highest risk of relapse will help focus prevention efforts.