2024 Young Investigator Grant recipients Samantha Abram, PhD (left), and Xiyu Zhu, PhD (right)
Two UC San Francisco Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences researchers—faculty member Samantha Abram, PhD, and postdoctoral scholar Xiyu Zhu, PhD—have been awarded 2024 Young Investigator Grants by the Brain & Behavior Research Foundation (BBRF) in recognition of their work as promising young scientists conducting innovative, cutting-edge neurobiological and psychiatric research. They are among 150 scientists from around the world selected to receive a combined $10.4 million in grants to further their research.
The two-year awards will provide them each with up to $70,000 for the purposes of extending their research fellowship training or fostering a career as an independent research faculty member. In addition, they will be eligible for consideration to present at the foundation's annual scientific symposium.
“BBRF Young Investigator grants fund groundbreaking research aimed at reducing suffering in people with mental illness,” said UCSF professor Judith M. Ford, PhD, who also serves as president of the BBRF Scientific Council and co-chair of the Young Investigator Grant Selection Committee. “These early-career scientists are pushing the boundaries in basic and clinical research to establish new approaches to early prediction, prevention, and intervention, and to develop next-generation therapies that offer hope for those with brain and behavior illnesses.”
Awarded projects to further basic science research and development of next-generation therapies
Samantha Abram, PhD, is an assistant adjunct professor based at the San Francisco VA Medical Center, where she also completed her advanced postdoctoral training in schizophrenia research. She is interested in avolition, or difficulty in initiating and sustaining goal-oriented behavior. It is a strong predictor of poor functional outcomes in schizophrenia and largely resistant to available treatments. Abram seeks to uncover the underlying mechanisms of avolition using a combination of neurostimulation—specifically theta-burst stimulation (TBS)—and neuroimaging tools such as electroencephalography (EEG) and magnetic resonance imaging (MRI). Her aim is to evaluate whether stimulation of the episodic memory network with TBS improves memory performance and EEG-derived markers of corresponding network function in a large sample of people with schizophrenia.
Xiyu Zhu, PhD, is a postdoctoral scholar in the lab of department member Vikaas Sohal, MD, PhD. His research work centers on determining the circuit mechanisms underlying stress-induced cognitive inflexibility, a transdiagnostic dysfunction observed in various psychopathologies, including schizophrenia and autism spectrum disorder (ASD). He participated recently in a study which uncovered a novel callosal projection from parvalbumin (PV) neurons in the prefrontal cortex (PFC) that can bidirectionally regulate cognitive flexibility behaviors. Building on these findings and other genes identified by the Schizophrenia Exome Sequencing Meta-analysis Consortium (SCHEMA), Zhu now hopes to determine if PFC callosal PV circuitry represents a common pathway through which genetic risks contribute to schizophrenia- or ASD-related cognitive deficits. The study promises novel insights into the etiology of these disorders and holds significant translational potential for improving diagnosis and developing biomarker-guided treatment.
Expanding the impact of groundbreaking research by supporting early-career scientists
BBRF Young Investigator Grants are designed to help researchers launch their careers in neuroscience and psychiatric research and gather pilot data to apply for larger federal and university grants on research relevant to the understanding, treatment, and prevention of serious brain and behavior disorders such as schizophrenia, mood disorders, anxiety disorders, or child and adolescent mental illnesses. Since the program's founding in 1987, it has awarded more than 6,700 grants totaling over $461 million in funding. Its grants have supported the ongoing work of more than 5,600 leading scientists around the world.
“BBRF Young Investigators represent a new generation of researchers who will pioneer breakthroughs in mental health research. They are at the cutting edge of progress in brain and psychiatric research,” said BBRF President and CEO Jeffrey Borenstein, MD. “We are excited to be able to support the work of these young scientists who will apply powerful new technologies and insights to understanding, treating, and curing mental illness.”
This year, BBRF received 748 grant applications and the selected recipients represent 99 institutions in 15 countries. Grant awardees were selected by the BBRF's Scientific Council, comprised of 195 leading experts across disciplines in brain and behavior research, including one Nobel Prize winner, three recipients of the National Medal of Science, seven members of the National Academy of Sciences, 14 National Institute of Health chiefs and directors, 45 chairs of psychiatry and neuroscience departments at leading medical institutions, 47 members of the National Academy of Medicine, and nine UCSF Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences faculty members.
In addition to the pair named this year, 61 other members of the UCSF Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences—including nearly three dozen current faculty members—have been honored as Young Investigator grant recipients since 1987.
About UCSF Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences
The UCSF Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences and the Langley Porter Psychiatric Institute are among the nation's foremost resources in the fields of child, adolescent, adult, and geriatric mental health. Together they constitute one of the largest departments in the UCSF School of Medicine and the UCSF Weill Institute for Neurosciences, with a mission focused on research (basic, translational, clinical), teaching, patient care, and public service.
UCSF Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences conducts its clinical, educational, and research efforts at a variety of locations in Northern California, including the UCSF Nancy Friend Pritzker Psychiatry Building; UCSF Langley Porter Psychiatric Hospital; UCSF Medical Centers at Parnassus Heights, Mission Bay, and Mount Zion; UCSF Benioff Children’s Hospitals in San Francisco and Oakland; Zuckerberg San Francisco General Hospital and Trauma Center; the San Francisco VA Health Care System; UCSF Fresno; and numerous community-based sites around the San Francisco Bay Area.
About the UCSF Weill Institute for Neurosciences
The UCSF Weill Institute for Neurosciences, established by the extraordinary generosity of Joan and Sanford I. "Sandy" Weill, brings together world-class researchers with top-ranked physicians to solve some of the most complex challenges in the human brain.
The UCSF Weill Institute leverages UCSF’s unrivaled bench-to-bedside excellence in the neurosciences. It unites three UCSF departments—Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, Neurology, and Neurological Surgery—that are highly esteemed for both patient care and research, as well as the Neuroscience Graduate Program, a cross-disciplinary alliance of nearly 100 UCSF faculty members from 15 basic-science departments, as well as the UCSF Institute for Neurodegenerative Diseases, a multidisciplinary research center focused on finding effective treatments for Alzheimer’s disease, frontotemporal dementia, Parkinson’s disease, and other neurodegenerative disorders.
About UCSF
The University of California, San Francisco (UCSF) is exclusively focused on the health sciences and is dedicated to promoting health worldwide through advanced biomedical research, graduate-level education in the life sciences and health professions, and excellence in patient care. UCSF Health, which serves as UCSF’s primary academic medical center, includes top-ranked specialty hospitals and other clinical programs, and has affiliations throughout the Bay Area.
