Featured Profile

Each year, NARSAD holds a variety of scientific symposia to inform the public about the latest developments in mental health research. Topics in 2006 ranged from new depression treatments to brain imaging of psychiatric illnesses.

Below are links to summaries of the various symposia that NARSAD presented during the year.




Sarasota Symposium (January 7) and Palm Beach Symposium (March 11), Highlight Mood Disorders, Nicotine Dependence

• John Rush, Jr., M.D., University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center at Dallas, provides an overview of treatments for depression


• Joseph Calabrese, M. D., Case Western Reserve University, details treatments for bipolar disorder


• John O’Reardon, M.D., University of Pennsylvania, discusses devices in the treatment of depression


• Wade Berrittini, M.D., Ph.D., University of Pennsylvania, speaks of the need to treat nicotine dependency in the mentally ill

• Daniel Pine, M.D., National Institute of Mental Health, talks about mood disorders in children


• B. Timothy Walsh, M.D., Columbia University and New York State Psychiatric Institute, addresses eating disorders


• David Posey, M.D., Indiana University, describes his work in autism


• Ellen Leibenluft, M.D., National Institute of Mental Health, explains her findings about bipolar disorder

• Amelia Gallitano-Mendel, M.D., Ph.D., talks about the interplay of genes and the environment in mental illness


• John Newcomer, M.D., discusses the metabolic side effects of antipsychotic drugs


• Joan Luby, M.D., addresses the need to treat depression in young children


• Yvette Sheline, M.D., describes her work in brain imaging of depression

• Jonathan Picker, M.D., Ph.D., Children’s Hospital, Boston, speaks on the genetics of schizophrenia


• Maurizio Fava, M.D., Harvard Medical School and Massachusetts General Hospital, explains the effectiveness of antidepressant medications


• Gina Kuperberg, M.D., Ph.D., Tufts University and Massachusetts General Hospital, describes brain imaging studies of people with schizophrenia


• Christopher Walsh, M.D., Ph.D., Harvard Medical School, Children’s Hospital and Beth Israel Deaconess, details his work on searching for the causes of autism

• Mark Ansorge, Ph.D., Columbia University, talks about serotonin and depression


• Selena Bartlett, Ph.D.,Ernest Gallo Clinic and Research Center, University of California, San Fransisco, describes dopamine trafficking in schizophrenia


• Jean-Claude Beique, Ph.D., Johns Hopkins University, addresses synapse proteins and schizophrenia


• Stephanie L. Borgland, Ph.D.,Ernest Gallo Clinic and Research Center, University of California, San Francisco, describes orexin's possible role in addiction


• Colleen McClung, Ph.D.,University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, deals with circadian rhythms and their role in mood disorders

• Robert Berman, M.D., Ph.D.,New York State Psychiatric Institute and New York-Presbyterian Hospital, describes a new brain stimulation method for depression


• Amanda Guyer, Ph.D., Columbia University and the New York State Psychiatric Institute, addresses children at risk for bipolar disorder


• Steven F. Kendell, Ph.D.,Yale University School of Medicine, Kettering Medical Center and Connecticut Mental Health Center, discusses a possible drug for treatment-resistant depression


• Jason Scalia, Ph.D., Columbia University, talks about depression and hippocampal neurogenesis


• Hugh Brent Solvason, M.D., Ph.D., Stanford University School of Medicine, deals with antipsychotic drug side effects

• Dimitri Avramopoulos, M.D., Ph.D., Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, describes the genetics of schizophrenia


• Stefania Bonaccorso, M.D., Ph.D., Vanderbilt University, talks about improving cognition in schizoprenia


• Karin E. Borgmann-Winter, M.D., University of Pennsylvania and Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, discusses a method to assess psychosis risk in adolescents


• Steven R. Laviolette, Ph.D.,The Schulich School of Medicine at the University of Western Ontario, deals with emotional processing in schizophrenia


• Anita Ramani, Ph.D., New York University School of Medicine, describes a new brain imaging techinique to study brain structure in schizophrenia

Top of page