An ad hoc committee will organize and host a public workshop inviting participants from academia, the pharmaceutical industry, NIH and the FDA to present and discuss strategies to accelerate development, validation, and implementation of glutamate biomarkers as tools to advance drug development for nervous system disorders associated with glutamatergic dysfunction.

Specifically, workshop participants will be invited to:

• Briefly outline the need for glutamate-related biomarkers both for understanding the causes of neurological diseases associated with glutamatergic dysfunction, and for accelerating drug development and therapeutic decision-making for these disorders.
• Discuss the most promising current and emerging technologies and analytical methods for assessing glutamatergic neurotransmission, and identify the research gaps for their development into biomarkers.

• Outline approaches for biomarker validation in preclinical and clinical studies, including relevant animal models and translational challenges.
• Discuss the implementation and regulatory barriers to incorporating glutamatergic biomarkers into drug development for neurological disease and approaches to overcome them
• Identify the next steps to establish principles and procedures to accelerate biomarker development, validation, and implementation in clinical trials, including frameworks for partnerships andcollaboration

An individually authored summary of the workshop will be prepared in accordance with institutional policy and procedures.