The National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) is one of 27 institutes and centers that make up the National Institutes of Health (NIH). The NIH, in turn, is an agency of the United States Department of Health and Human Services and is the primary agency of the United States government responsible for biomedical and health-related research.
The New York State Psychiatric Institute, located at the Columbia University Irving Medical Center in the Washington Heights neighborhood of Manhattan, New York City, was established in 1895 as one of the first institutions in the United States to integrate teaching, research and therapeutic approaches to the care of patients with mental illnesses. In 1925, the Institute affiliated with Presbyterian Hospital, now NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital, adding general hospital facilities to the institute's psychiatric services and research laboratories.
The Doctor of Medicine–Doctor of Philosophy (MD–PhD) is a dual doctoral program for physician–scientists, combining the professional training of the Doctor of Medicine degree with the research program of the Doctor of Philosophy degree.
Herbert Pardes was an American physician, psychiatrist, and the executive vice-chairman of NewYork–Presbyterian Hospital.
F. Xavier Castellanos is a Bolivian neuroscientist who is the director of research at the NYU Child Study Center. His work aims at elucidating the neuroscience of ADHD through structural and functional brain imaging studies, collaborating on molecular genetic studies, and coordinating an interdisciplinary network of translational investigators. Dr. Castellanos chaired the NIH ‘Initial Review Group’ on Developmental Psychopathology and Developmental Disabilities from 2005–2007 and is chairing the revision of the diagnostic criteria for externalizing disorders for the forthcoming edition of DSM-V, projected for 2012. He continues to make significant contributions to research into the neurobiological substrates of attention deficit hyperactivity disorder.
Erminio "Mimo" Costa was an Italian-American neuroscientist. His research interests covered brain serotonergic activity in health and disease, benzodiazepine-GABA interactions, benzodiazepine action at GABAA receptors, neurophysiological role of neurosteroids, and GABAergic dysfunction and changes in the expression of reelin and GAD67 in schizophrenia. He published more than 1,000 articles. The June 2011 issue of the journal Neuropharmacology was dedicated to him.
Thomas Roland Insel is an American neuroscientist, psychiatrist, entrepreneur, and author who led the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) from 2002 until November 2015. Prior to becoming Director of NIMH, he was the founding Director of the Center for Behavioral Neuroscience at Emory University in Atlanta, Georgia. He is best known for research on oxytocin and vasopressin, two peptide hormones implicated in complex social behaviors, such as parental care and attachment. He announced on Sept. 15, 2015, that he was resigning as the director of the NIMH to join the Life Science division of Google X. On May 8, 2017, CNBC reported that he had left Verily Life Sciences. Insel is a Co-founder with Richard Klausner and Paul Dagum of a digital mental health company named "Mindstrong," a Bay-area startup. He has also co-founded Humanest Care, NeuraWell Therapeutics, and MindSite News and is a member of the scientific advisory board for Compass Pathways, a company that is developing the psychedelic drug psilocybin to treat depression and other mental health disorders. His book, Healing: Our Path from Mental Illness to Mental Health was published by Penguin Random House in February, 2022.
Jeffrey Alan Lieberman is an American psychiatrist who specializes in schizophrenia and related psychoses and their associated neuroscience (biology) and pharmacological treatment. He was principal investigator for CATIE, the largest and longest independent study ever funded by the United States National Institute of Mental Health to examine existing pharmacotherapies for schizophrenia. He was president of the American Psychiatric Association from May 2013 to May 2014.
William T. Carpenter is an American psychiatrist, a pioneer in the fields of psychiatry and pharmacology who served as an expert witness in the John W. Hinckley trial for the attempted assassination of U.S. President Ronald Reagan. His primary professional interest is in severe mental illness, especially schizophrenia, to the prevention and treatment of which he has made significant contributions in psychopathology, assessment methodology, testing of new treatments, and research ethics.
Mary Jane Rotheram-Borus is a licensed clinical psychologist and professor with the University of California, Los Angeles, Department of Psychiatry and Biobehavioral Sciences. Rotheram is the professor-in-residence in the Semel Institute for Neuroscience and Human Behavior. She is the Director of the Global Center for Children and Families at UCLA and the former director of the Center for HIV Identification, Prevention, and Treatment Services.
Lori Altshuler was a professor at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) Department of Psychiatry and Biobehavioral Sciences and held the Julia S. Gouw Endowed Chair for Mood Disorders. Altshuler was the Director of the UCLA Mood Disorders Research Program and the UCLA Women's Life Center, each being part of the Neuropsychiatric Hospital at UCLA.
Judith L. Rapoport is an American psychiatrist. She is the chief of the Child Psychiatry Branch at the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH), part of the National Institutes of Health (NIH) in Bethesda, Maryland.
Steven M. Paul is an American neuroscientist and pharmaceutical executive. Paul was the former CEO, president, and chairman of Karuna Therapeutics.
John M. Kane is an American psychiatrist who served as the Chair of Psychiatry at the Zucker Hillside Hospital for 34 years. He also served as the Chair of Psychiatry at The Donald and Barbara Zucker School of Medicine at Hofstra/Northwell for its first 12 years. He stepped down from these roles in 2022 to focus his efforts on his research and mentorship of early career investigators as co-director, Institute of Behavioral Science at the Feinstein Institutes for Medical Research, part of Northwell Health.
Kathleen Ries Merikangas is the Chief of the Genetic Epidemiology Research Branch in the Intramural Research Program at the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) and an adjunct professor of epidemiology at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. She has published more than 300 papers, and is best known for her work in adolescent mental disorders.
Lewis Lund Judd was an American neurobiologist and psychiatrist. He served as director of the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) from 1988 to 1992, chair of the Department of Psychiatry at the University of California, San Diego from 1977 to 2013, and as a vice president of the American Psychiatric Association. As NIMH director he helped develop the "Decade of the Brain", a research plan designed "to bring a precise and detailed understanding of all the elements of brain function within our own lifetime."
Kafui Dzirasa is an American psychiatrist and Associate Professor at Duke University. He looks to understand the relationship between neural circuit malfunction and mental illness. He was a 2019 AAAS Leshner Fellow and was elected Fellow of the National Academy of Medicine in 2021.
Tracy Bale is an American neuroscientist and molecular biologist. She is the Anschutz Foundation Endowed Chair in Women’s Integrated Mental and Physical Health Research at the Ludeman Center, Director of InterGenerational Stress and Health, and Director of Sex Differences Research in the Department of Psychiatry at the University of Colorado, Anschutz Medical Campus in Aurora, Colorado. Her research centers on the role of parental, prenatal, and early life stress on the developing brain and subsequent behavior throughout the lifespan. She is also the current President of the International Brain Research Organization.
Pamela Y. Collins is an American psychiatrist. She is the Director of the International Training and Education Center for Health (I-TECH) and the Global Mental Health Program at the University of Washington School of Medicine and School of Public Health. Collins is professor of psychiatry and behavioral sciences and of global health. She previously worked as the director of the Office for Research on Disparities and Global Mental Health at the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH).
Robert H. Felix was an American psychiatrist and administrator who served as the first director of the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) from 1949 to 1964 and a former president of the American Psychiatric Association.
