Several of our faculty members play key roles in these local research centers:
The Conte Center for Neuroscience of Mental Disorders / Taylor Family Institute for Innovative Psychiatric Research at Washington University School of Medicine is a multidisciplinary research program dedicated to the study of schizophrenia, involving investigators in psychiatry, psychology, radiology, and basic neuroscience. A primary goal of the Conte Center is to advance understanding of the underlying causes of schizophrenia through studying its early development.
The Early Emotional Development Program (EEDP) was founded at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis in 1998. It is directed by Joan Luby, MD, a child psychiatrist who specializes in the identification and treatment of early onset mental disorders, including depression. The EEDP encompasses clinical and research programs focused on the mental health and emotional development of very young children. The program’s mental health services and research studies focus primarily on helping children from infancy through the preschool period (up to age 6). Additionally, the program houses one of the largest and longest studies of emotion development and emotion disorders following children into early adolescence.
The Washington University Intellectual and Developmental Disability Research Center (IDDRC@WUSTL) along with partner St. Louis Children’s Hospital, is part of a network of 14 Intellectual and Developmental Disability Research Centers (IDDRC’s) funded by the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development through an act of Congress in 1963. The IDDRC@WUSTL is focused on four research themes: (1) the prediction and prevention of preterm birth, (2) elucidation of core elements of risk and resilience for IDD, (3) characterization of the developing human brain, and (4) understanding cellular and molecular mechanisms of genetic risk for IDD. The IDDRC@WUSTL advances this agenda through four core scientific facilities that are designed to support scientific endeavors to clarify genetic and environmental causes of IDD, examining and modifying these causal factors in cellular and animal model systems, exploring their impact on the developing human brain, and translating the resulting knowledge into higher-impact intervention to prevent or treat intellectual and developmental disabilities.