“What transexuals have always asserted is that they think like the other gender,” said Dr. Joy Shaffer, a San Jose, CA physician who is leading the project. “What we want to do is to confirm research done by others since 1982 that show brain structure differences between men and women to see what is going on with transexuals.

“There have been studies that have in part looked for biological causes of transexuality, specifically hormone levels,” she said. “But these have not found any differences between the study subjects and controls. We are going to look at it from an anatomical point of view.”

Central to the project will be magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) scans of the brains of volunteers. The process is painless and the project is seeking male-to-female and most especially female-to-male volunteers. The project is being coordinated by Transexual Research Associates in the Natural Sciences (TRANS), an organization that has a pending application for nonprofit status.

Shaffer said the focus of the research will be on the corpus callosum, a structure in the brain that connects its' two halves. She suspects that the structure in MTF transexuals may look more like that of women while FTMs may have structure more akin to those of men.

In 1991 Drs. Roger Gorsky and Laura Allen at the University of California, Los Angeles found that this connector was somewhat larger in women than men. Ever since the research was reported there has been a great deal of speculation over whether it proves that men and women think differently and approach problem-solving in different ways.

The transexual study will be done in cooperation with a network of four Hitachi 7000 “open” MRI scanning centers suitable for large or claustrophobic persons. Sites include Renton, WA, New York City, San Jose, CA, and Huntington Beach, CA. The sites in Renton, NYC and Huntington Beach are FTM ONLY.

Collaborators include Barton Lane, MD, Stanford Dept of Neuroradiology; Virginia McCarter, PhD, UCSF Institute for Health Policy Studies Statistician; Shannon Burke, PhD, of Norcon in San Jose; Myles Schwartz, Ph.D, NYC; Anne Lawrence, MD in Seattle and Los Angeles. History taking of study participants will be done by myself, Dr Lawrence, or Dr. Schwartz.

Each subject will be identified by a unique code number. Each study participant will be scanned for about 10 minutes on one of our MRIs. The digital images will be analyzed blindly using computer graphics software. No compensation is available for subjects, who will all be volunteers. on the other hand, there are no known risks or side effects of this noncontrast MRI scanning. Some of the investigators will also be test subjects. The MRI images will become the property of the researchers Since individual results are not meaningful, and may be misinterpreted, personal results will not be reported to test subjects.

Results will not be published until a quantity and qualily of data is available to pass rigorous peer review.

Scans cost the researchers $100 each. If you would like to help offset these costs contact one of the researchers at the email addresses below.

If you would like to volunteer to be a test subject contact:

Seattle Area: Dr. Anne Lawrence
NYC Area: Dr Myles Schwartz
Bay Area/Southern California: Dr. Joy Shaffer

Phone: 1-800-DRJOYMD
Fax: 1-408-292-5560