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 Biography   Stephan Heckers, M.D. James G. Blakemore Professor and Chairman Department of Psychiatry Vanderbilt University To explore the neural basis of psychiatric disorders, Dr. Heckers and his group combine neuroimaging experiments of brain structure and function in psychotic patients with postmortem studies of the cellular and molecular basis of psychosis. Of particular interest are the mechanisms of cognitive deficits and psychotic symptoms in schizophrenia and bipolar disorder. The hippocampus, a small region in the temporal lobe of the brain, appears to play an important role in both memory deficits and psychotic symptoms. Using functional neuroimaging, Dr. Heckers has demonstrated that impaired recruitment of the hippocampus is related to the decreased ability of patients with schizophrenia to retrieve previously learned information. Complementary studies of postmortem hippocampal specimens have shown decreased neuron number and gene expression for subsets of interneurons in both schizophrenia and bipolar disorder. Dr. Heckers joined NARSAD’s Scientific Council in 2005 and received NARSAD Young Investigator Awards in 1991 and 1998 and a Klerman Award Honorable Mention in 2002. |
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