I am a clinical psychiatrist by training, and neuroscientist. I have devoted my research career to understanding mechanisms, nature and time-course of intractable psychiatric illnesses, such as obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD). I am an Associate Professor in the Departments of Psychiatry and Neurology at Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH), Harvard Medical School. I serve as Director of the Center for Morphometric Analysis, Department of Psychiatry at MGH, and as Director of Computational Imaging Anatomy at the Psychiatry Neuroimaging Laboratory, Department of Psychiatry, Brigham & Women?s Hospital (BWH), where I hold secondary appointments, at Psychiatry and Radiology, as a research scientist. I have been conducting NIH sponsored research since 2003, when I received my first R03 award. I am currently a PI on two NIH grants (R01, funded by NIA & NIMH; R21 funded by NCCIH) focused on understanding mechanisms of brain development, maturation and aging through a set of neuroimaging tools and their validation in rhesus monkeys. Those two grants together have the potential of delivering validated neuroimaging biomarkers, which could be used to diagnose and monitor neurobiological changes due to myelin loss and neuroinflammation in aging, and a whole list of other neuropsychiatric diseases where those changes are involved. Furthermore, I?m a PI in a new grant (R01MH111917), which specifically focuses on retrospective investigation of imaging- based targeting for DBS in OCD and serves as the scientific basis upon which this K24 application is hoping to extend in depth and scope. Besides my research, I am also involved in mentoring Harvard, MIT and BU undergraduate and graduate students, postdoctoral fellows (including K23 awardees), foreign fellows, and summer students. I am also involved in administrative work, as head of two large laboratories, at MGH and at BWH, and various local and regional committees. Finally, I am getting involved in nonclinical and non-POR research (through my ongoing and pending animal projects), and that takes away from both my mentoring and my POR research. The K24 would protect time and help me to focus on most important for my career development- mentoring (30%), further training and new POR (20%), while devoting remaining 50% to ongoing neuroimaging research in biomarkers of white matter changes in aging and OCD.

Public Health Relevance

Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder (OCD) and other intractable psychiatric illnesses affect 2% of the population, yet the underlying neurobiology, as well as longitudinal natural course are not known. K24 will help support mentoring and training of both the PI and the talented junior clinical scientists in clinical research aimed at understanding biological mechanisms of brain pathology affecting connectivity in OCD. Furthermore, it will enhance the discovery of new targets for medication resistant OCD using DBS.

Agency
National Institute of Health (NIH)
Institute
National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH)
Type
Midcareer Investigator Award in Patient-Oriented Research (K24)
Project #
5K24MH116366-03
Application #
10001008
Study Section
Neural Basis of Psychopathology, Addictions and Sleep Disorders Study Section (NPAS)
Program Officer
Chavez, Mark
Project Start
2018-09-18
Project End
2023-08-31
Budget Start
2020-09-01
Budget End
2021-08-31
Support Year
3
Fiscal Year
2020
Total Cost
Indirect Cost
Name
Massachusetts General Hospital
Department
Type
DUNS #
073130411
City
Boston
State
MA
Country
United States
Zip Code
02114