Campus & Community

NARSAD awards professors for breakthrough schizophrenia research

2 min read

Associate Professor of Psychiatry Marc J. Kaufman and Associate Professor of Psychology Dara Manoach, both of Harvard Medical School, are among 42 innovative researchers awarded NARSAD 2010 Independent Investigator grants for schizophrenia research.

Kaufman, also an associate of Harvard-affiliated McLean Hospital, will receive $99,723 for a pilot study adapting a special imaging technique associated with MRI to better measure and analyze glycine levels in the brains of patients with schizophrenia. The ability to absorb and metabolize glycine varies from patient to patient and alters the effectiveness of antipsychotic medications in the treatment of schizophrenia. Kaufman and colleagues seek to optimize glycine augmentation therapy with these new results, thus improving the efficacy of antipsychotic medications.

Manoach will receive $100,000 to build upon her earlier studies revealing that memory processing associated with schizophrenia is impaired due to faulty memory processing over time and during sleep. Manoach now seeks to distinguish between deficits in memory consolidation that occur in the waking state and during sleep in patients with schizophrenia.

Independent investigators seek to produce experimental results that will put them in a position to initiate major research programs and request major governmental grants. Receiving up to $100,000 over two years, they lead research programs of clinical and basic science investigations into the causes, mechanisms, and treatments for serious psychiatric disorders.

For more on the award and its recipients, visit the NARSAD website.