FIU Delves Into Landmark Drug & Brain Development Study

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MIAMI (CBSMiami) -- A South Florida university is set to take part in a landmark study on drugs and adolescent brain development.

Florida International University (FIU) will follow hundreds of local children, ages 9 and 10, as they grow up and become adolescents who have a higher risk of substance use.

They'll be looking at their possible exposure to nicotine, alcohol, marijuana among other things.

"Adolescents have access to high potency marijuana and greater varieties of nicotine delivery devices than previous generations. We want to know how that and other trends affect the trajectory of the developing brain," said  Nora D. Volkow, director of NIH's National Institute on Drug Abuse.

The National Institutes of Health (NIH) awarded FIU $12.7 million to take part in the study.

The university's study is part of a larger research project, dubbed the Adolescent Brain Cognitive Development (ABCD) study in which other universities will also take part following 10,000 children in the United States.

Researchers plan to use the information for prevention and treatment information, public health strategies and policy decisions.

"Taking responsibility for finding solutions to the problem of adolescent drug use, which robs our youth of their future and costs our country millions in lost productivity, we have assembled a dream team of researchers," said FIU President Mark B. Rosenberg."This project will impact our community and the nation for years to come."