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PRINCIPAL INVESTIGATOR
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Tyrone D. Cannon Ph.D.
Staglin Family Professor
Departments of Psychology, Psychiatry, and Human Genetics
Email: cannon@psych.ucla.edu
Tyrone D. Cannon is the Staglin Family Professor of Psychology, Psychiatry &
Biobehavioral Sciences, the Carol Moss Spivak Scholar in Neuroscience, and
the Director of the Staglin Music Festival Center for Cognitive Neuroscience
at UCLA. Dr. Cannon earned his bachelor’s degree at Dartmouth College (1985)
and his doctoral degree at the University of Southern California (1990). He
spent a year in clinical training at the UCLA Neuropsychiatric Institute
(1990-1991), before taking his first academic appointment in the Department
of Psychology at the University of Pennsylvania, where he was promoted to
associate professor with tenure in 1997. He joined the faculty at UCLA in
1999. Dr. Cannon’s research aims to discover the causes of schizophrenia
and bipolar disorder and to develop effective treatment and prevention
strategies based on an understanding of the genetic and neural mechanisms
that give rise to these disorders. His studies have focused on elucidating
the genetic and non-genetic factors that influence susceptibility to
schizophrenia and bipolar disorder and delineating their effects on brain
structure and functioning across development, with a particular emphasis on
gestational (pre- and perinatal) and adolescent periods of brain development
A hallmark of his work is the integration of molecular biological and
neuroimaging approaches in unique populations such as twins discordant for
schizophrenia and bipolar disorder and selected members of large
prospectively evaluated birth cohorts who have developed one of these
conditions in adulthood. Recent work has incorporated transgenic animal
models and has extended this translational human-animal genetics and
neuroscience strategy to Neurofibromatosis 1, an inherited condition
affecting brain structure and function. With support from the Music Festival
for Mental Health and the National Institute of Mental Health, Dr. Cannon
has established a clinical research center for early detection and
prevention of major mental illness in at risk youth based in the UCLA
Neuropsychiatric Institute. In that project he and his colleagues are
ascertaining individuals who are at risk for imminent onset of psychosis and
following them in longitudinal neuroimaging studies aimed at identifying the
neural changes that occur proximally to onset of psychosis. |
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FACULTY
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Carrie Bearden, Ph.D.
Assistant Professor in Residence
Department of Psychiatry and Biobehavioral Sciences
Email: cbearden@mednet.ucla.edu
I am particularly interested in early cognitive and behavioral predictors
of psychopathology, and their underlying neuroanatomical correlates. A
key area of my research focus involves the dynamic processes that occur
during adolescence, which may have special relevance to the development
of psychotic illness. I hope that this work will ultimately help to elucidate
the neurodevelopmental 'signature' of susceptibility to psychosis, and
as such, will allow us to work towards the development of early intervention
and, ultimately, preventive strategies. |
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Theo van Erp, Ph.D.
Assistant Researcher, Department of Psychology
Email: vanerp@psych.ucla.edu
My research interests are in understanding the nature, sources
(genetic/environmental), and pathogenesis (development) of
the
neural mechanisms underlying schizophrenia, through the use
of behavioral, brain morphological (MRI), biochemical (MRS),
and functional (fMRI) measures. My current research focuses
mainly on understanding the sources of hippocampal volume
reduction
and the nature and the sources of the episodic memory deficit
observed in the disorder. |
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POST DOCTORAL FELLOWS
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Weidong Li, Ph.D.
Email: weidongli@mednet.ucla.edu
Molecular and cellular basis of schizophrenia. To develop,
study and test animal models of schizophrenia. |
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Frank Sun
Email: sun@lifesci.ucla.edu
I am interested in the relationship between the neuropathology
of
schizophrenia and late brain development. Currently I am involved
in a
longitudinal structural MRI study on brain changes in schizophrenia. |
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Katie Karlsgodt, Ph.D.
Email: karlsgodt@psych.ucla.edu
My main research interest is in studying memory processes,
both in
healthy subjects and in patients with schizophrenia. I'm particularly
intrigued by mechanisms underlying verbal working memory as
well as the
relationship between working memory and long term memory. I'm
also
interested in the connectivity of the cortical regions that
support
these systems, and plan to investigate this functional connectivity
using fMRI and structural connectivity using diffusion tensor
imaging
(DTI). |
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Becca Schwarzlose, Ph.D.
Email: beccafs at ucla dot edu
My research interests focus on the study of cognitive processing in schizophrenia and bipolar disorder in combination with genetic and neural information. I'm particularly interested in using cognitive neuroscience techniques such as fMRI to identify the stages of cognitive processing that can be disrupted in schizophrenia, resulting in working memory and long-term memory impairments. I'm also interested in using measures of cognitive functioning as endophenotypes for genetic investigations of schizophrenia and bipolar disorder and to elucidate their commonalities and differences. |
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Vijay Mittal, Ph.D.
Email: vijay117@aol.com |
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ALUMNI
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Peter Bachman, Ph.D.
Email: bachman@psych.ucla.edu
My research focuses on the physiological
and genetic correlates of cognitive
dysfunction in schizophrenia – specifically,
what studies utilizing electroencephalography
(EEG) recorded from patients and their
biological relatives can tell us about
the mechanisms resulting disrupted
attention and short-term memory. Characterizing
these mechanisms is a critical step
in understanding the pathophysiology
of schizophrenia, which is, in turn,
an important step in improving existing
treatments. Additionally, better characterizing
phenotypes related to genetic vulnerability
to developing schizophrenia might prove
useful in attempts to prevent the onset
and progression of the disease. |
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Soohyun Cho, Ph.D.
Email: shcho@ucla.edu
I am interested in the nature and neurobiological
substrates of cognitive
deficits and emotional changes related to schizophrenia.
My current
research project focuses on relational integration and
working memory using behavioral measurements and fMRI.
I hope to contribute to the study of the genetic liability
of schizophrenia by studying abnormalities in prefrontal
functions which are considered as promising endophenotypic
markers of the disease. |
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Lauren Ellman, Ph.D.
Email: ellman@psych.ucla.edu
My research focuses on the putative
roles of pre- and perinatal events
in the etiology of schizophrenia. I
currently am involved in two related
areas of research. One examining the
role of perinatal hypoxia on the developmental
course of schizophrenia and the other
investigating the role of maternal
stress during pregnancy on premorbid
functioning and psychotic status in
offspring. Both studies employ strategies
of exploring the relative contributions
of genetic factors by using population-based
models in both Finnish and American
birth cohorts. Understanding how these
early environmental insults affect
the neurodevelopmental course of the
disorder is critical in efforts towards
prevention and treatment. |
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Jacqueline Horwitz, Ph.D.
Email: jacquieh@ucla.edu
My research focuses mainly
on emotion and social cognition in normal and disordered populations,
and their neural substrates as measured by fMRI. One of my
research questions is how these abilities interact with cognitive
functions such as memory, attention and executive function.
I hope to clarify the nature of the deficit in emotion and
social cognitive abilities in schizophrenic populations, how
they interact with deficits in working memory and executive
function, how these abilities change over the course of schizophrenia,
and how they may predict outcome. |
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Tara Niendam, Ph.D.
Email: tniendam@ucla.edu
I am interested in the development of major Axis I psychopathology,
specifically schizophrenia, from its first presentation in
childhood through its full manifestation in adolescence or
adulthood. Currently, a focus in schizophrenia research is
on the neurodevelopmental processes and related cognitive deficits
associated with the disorder. I would like to use neuropsychological
measures to examine how changes in brain structure are related
to changes in cognitive functioning. Overall, I think adolescence
is an essential period of human development that has received
little attention in research and I hope to add to our body
of knowledge in this area. |
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David Shirinyan, Ph.D.
Email: shirinyan@psych.ucla.edu
I'm currently working on neuropsychological
test development aimed at assessing executive functioning in
patient groups and in healthy populations. Through the use
of fMRI, I hope to gain insight into the neural processes underlying
executive functions, memory, and emotion processing. |
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GRADUATE STUDENTS
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Chris Jetton
Email: jetton@psych.ucla.edu
I am interested in investigating
the functional role of oscillatory neural activity in human
information processing, and the possible disruption of this
process in schizophrenia. Specifically, I hope to clarify some
of the mechanisms by which different patterns of averaged event-related
potentials (ERPs) result from ongoing electroencephalographic
recording. It may be the case that ERP waveforms differ for
people with schizophrenia because of abnormalities in basic
processes like phase resetting and latency jitter. Finally,
I wish to clarify the impact of these deficits on behavioral
measures of information processing, as in perception, attention,
and expectation. |
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Tyler Lesh
Email: tlesh@ucla.edu |
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Rachael Willhite
Email: Rwillhite@ucla.edu |
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Evan Lutkenhoff
Email: lutkenhoff@ucla.edu |
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Amy Jimenez
Email: amjimenez@ucla.edu
My research focuses on examining the neural correlates of socio-emotional information processing and how genes and their variants give rise to individual differences in these processing abilities. I am also interested in deficits of the socio-emotional domain often symptomatic of severe psychopathology; namely, schizophrenia and bi-polar disorder. That is, I would like to elucidate how these deficits shed further light on the nature of these processes in healthy individuals and what risk aberrant development of these abilities might confer for such disorders. In future work I hope to utilize my findings to improve social skills and interpersonal relationships training and provide these as targeted, preemptive treatment options for at-risk individuals. |
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Rachel Higier
Email: higierr@ucla.edu
I aim to work towards an empirically based model of psychopathology from a neurobiological perspective. I am interested in using neuroimaging and genetic data to investigate the diagnostic boundaries between Axis I disorders and the subtypes of schizophrenia. I am particularly interested in how cognitive and affective impairments that are so often associated with varying psychiatric illnesses differ across specific diagnoses. My goal is to help isolate and then identify the essential biomarkers in order to guide clinical diagnosis and the development of novel treatments. |
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LAB RESEARCH STAFF
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Jamie Zinberg, MA
Email: jzinberg@mednet.ucla.edu
I am interested in exploring the influence of family factors
on the development and exacerbation of prodromal symptoms.
My research focuses on investigating the impact of families'
behaviors and testing and formulating early intervention strategies
during the prodrome. I am also interested in studying whether
prosocial family and social factors can be enhanced among a
clinic-seeking population in a way that attenuates the course
of a psychotic illness. |
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Molly Hardt
Email: hardt@ucla.edu |
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Sandra De Silva, Ph.D.
Email: desilva@psych.ucla.edu |
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Leila Kushan
Email: kushan@psych.ucla.edu |
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CAPPS/CNS ADMINISTRATIVE STAFF
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Adrienne Gallet
Administrative Analyst
Email: agallet@mednet.ucla.edu
If you have any questions about CAPPS or the CNS Lab please
call Adrienne at 310-794-9673. |
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