Translational Research Related Content

Can early life stress contribute to how COVID-19 affects a patient? That’s a question being asked by a McLean Hospital researcher in a national mental health study of college students in his native Pakistan that will be conducted over the next two years. The project is one of two undertaken by...

One of the persistent questions surrounding the reluctance of some women to get COVID-19 vaccinations is the potential impact on their reproductive health. A McLean Hospital researcher and some colleagues are working hard to provide some answers. “Women and parents of girls are very concerned about...

Julianne Wilner Tirpak, PhD, an early career psychologist, understands that dialectical behavior therapy (DBT) is the gold-standard treatment for young people who struggle to manage their emotions, particularly those who exhibit self-harm or suicidal behaviors. As the inaugural recipient of a unique...

Exposure and response prevention (ERP) is the gold standard therapy for people with obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD). But for some reason, it wasn’t effective for Anne and Andy Heller’s family member. So, the couple, who are members of McLean’s National Council and generous donors to OCD research...

With a $15,973,571, five-year grant from the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH), investigators from McLean Hospital and four other institutions will further their studies into the brain mechanisms behind depression and anxiety. Under the title “Novel Treatment Targets for Affective Disorders...

Renowned physician-scientist Daniel P. Dickstein, MD, FAAP, has come to McLean Hospital to further his groundbreaking research on the biology of childhood psychiatric disorders—and to help improve mental health care for children, teens, and young adults. Dickstein is uniquely trained and board...

McLean Hospital has partnered with the nonprofit arm of The Connor Group, a real estate investment firm, as well as the University of Dayton and Dayton Children’s Hospital, on a groundbreaking research project aimed at understanding the biological link between childhood hardships and mental...

Alcohol consumption is a common coping response to stress, and historically, it has increased in the United States following catastrophic events, such as terrorist attacks and large-scale natural disasters. Considering COVID-19, experts at McLean Hospital have published a viewpoint article in the...

McLean Hospital visiting scientist Suzanne Haber, PhD, is the recipient of the Gold Medal Award for 2020 from the Society of Biological Psychiatry (SOBP). The group recognized Haber for her many contributions to the study of neural networks that inform incentive learning and decision-making. “It’s a...

Laura Germine, PhD, thought that a chronic disease wouldn’t just affect her personal life. She also feared it would derail her career as a neuroscientist and researcher. Instead, her Type 1 diabetes diagnosis opened a new opportunity in which she would combine her skills as a software developer with...

Early detection has always been the watchword in the treatment of medical conditions. A multidisciplinary team of researchers led by Dost Öngür, MD, PhD, chief of the Division of Psychotic Disorders at McLean Hospital, aims to extend that to the diagnosis and treatment of psychosis. Fueled by a...

McLean Hospital’s Brent P. Forester, MD, MSc, is heading a new study of a training model to help primary care nurses better care for patients with dementia. Funded by a $54 million grant from the National Institute on Aging (NIA), the research effort is one of two pilot studies by the NIA’s IMPACT...

McLean Hospital researcher Staci Gruber, PhD, will use funding provided by Harvard University and MIT alumnus Charles R. Broderick to further her studies into different types of cannabis-based products. Last year, Broderick donated $9 million, split evenly between Harvard Medical School and MIT. The...

How do you predict which teenagers will develop clinical depression? Can you use brain activity, mood or behavior patterns, and other information? Are there targeted prevention strategies that could stop a vulnerable young person from plunging into depression? And for teenagers who are currently...

Every day on the job, Dawn Morrissey draws inspiration from McLean Hospital’s past. “When I walk through the hallway leading to the Administration Building on my way to meetings, I always look at the pictures on the wall of the female nurses, doctors, and scientists who have worked at McLean over...

A study by McLean Hospital’s Mary Kathryn Dahlgren, PhD, Staci Gruber, PhD, and their team from McLean’s Cognitive and Clinical Neuroimaging Core and the Marijuana Investigations for Neuroscientific Discovery (MIND) program, has found that recreational cannabis use affects driving ability even when...

Survival. In an animal kingdom enriched by a diversity of species, it is the one trait shared by organisms as simple as worms and as complex as humans. And the proof is in a protein with the hopelessly complex name of pituitary adenylate cyclase-activating polypeptide. Commonly referred to by...