One Mind Announces the Winners of the 2022 Rising Star Awards for Mental Health Research

$900,000 will be awarded to three emerging leaders pursuing innovative research to benefit people living with mental health conditions

RUTHERFORD, Calif.–(BUSINESS WIRE)–One Mind™, in collaboration with COMPASS Pathways plc, has announced the recipients of three “2022 One Mind – COMPASS Rising Stars Awards”. Each awardee will receive a $300,000 grant over a three year-period and leadership training through the One Mind Rising Star Development Program.

The One Mind Rising Star Awards supports early-career scientists in neuroscience, psychiatry, and related disciplines who are pursuing high-risk / high-reward research to advance the understanding, treatment, and prevention of mental health conditions. The awardees are selected through a competitive grants process administered by One Mind’s Scientific Advisory Board, which includes ten of the world’s leading scientists and clinicians.

“We are thrilled that One Mind can accelerate these visionary Rising Stars’ research,” states One Mind President Brandon Staglin. “We extend our gratitude to our sponsor, COMPASS Pathways, for their support of this important initiative. We’re excited to empower these early-career scientists as they answer crucial questions for better treatments, and ultimately help people with mental health challenges to live their fullest lives.”

“Innovation in mental health is needed more than ever, and supporting exceptional scientific talent is a vital part of this,” said Ekaterina Malievskaia, Chief Innovation Officer and Co-founder of COMPASS Pathways. “We’re honored to support promising early-career scientists who have the potential to advance the understanding of mental health conditions and change patient outcomes and experience with mental health care. Our gratitude goes to this year’s awardees, to everyone who applied and to One Mind for this important initiative – together we can build mental health care for the 21^st century.”

This year’s awardees are:

Xin Jin, Ph.D., Assistant Professor, Department of Neuroscience, The Scripps Research Institute, La Jolla, CA.

Seeing the perturbations: in vivo genetic screening approaches to psychiatric disorders: While progress has been made in identifying genetic risk factors for neuropsychiatric disorders, current research focuses on only a few genes and biological functions. Dr. Jin aims to identify the brain regions, cell types, and their relevant cellular features by developing novel, scalable technologies that characterize disease-relevant profiles across a large number of genes in a comprehensive analysis. By creating a high-throughput, in vivo genetic screening platform, she hopes to uncover new disease-relevant biology not observed using existing methodologies.

Alex Kwan, Ph.D., Associate Professor, Meinig School of Biomedical Engineering, Cornell University, Ithaca, New York.

The cortical circuit basis of fast-acting antidepressant action: Antidepressants are slow and often ineffective. Recent studies using the psychedelic psilocybin have shown promising results, yet the biological process behind psilocybin’s therapeutic action is not known. Dr. Kwan has shown that a single dose of psilocybin leads to the rapid formation of new and enduring neuronal connections in the brain. Using viral tracing, two-photon microscopy, and optogenetic manipulations, he hopes to uncover why new neuronal connections are created, which pathways are strengthened, and if these changes underlie psilocybin’s therapeutic effects.

Maryam Shanechi, Ph.D., Associate Professor and Viterbi Early Career Chair, Ming Hsieh Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, CA.

Deep learning of brain network biomarkers for neuropsychiatric disorders: Deep Brain Stimulation (DBS) holds promise for those living with depression, but open loop studies have yielded variable results across patients. Dr. Shanechi will develop a deep learning approach to identify precise neural biomarkers of depression symptoms in epilepsy patients with intracranial electrodes, a large proportion of whom also have comorbid depression. She hypothesizes that these biomarkers can more precisely track symptom states by fusing information across brain regions to enable personalized, closed-loop neurostimulation– moving us closer to precision psychiatry.

The 2022 Rising Stars will present their research at a special Scientific Symposium organized during the 28th One Mind Music Festival for Brain Health. The event will be held at the Staglin Family Vineyard in Rutherford, California on Saturday, September 10, 2022. Those interested in attending the scientific symposium in-person or online can register in advance here. Registered attendees for the online version will be provided with a link to the webcast before the September 10th airing. There is no cost to access the virtual symposium, but donations are greatly appreciated.

300 DPI digital images available upon request

About One Mind™

One Mind is a leading mental health non-profit that heals lives through science and advocacy. Around our collective vision of “Accelerating Brain Health for All”, One Mind is advancing a three-pronged program strategy of accelerating discoveries, scaling implementation and transforming societal culture. Together, we are creating a world where all individuals facing brain health challenges can build healthy, productive lives. www.onemind.org

About One Mind™ Rising Star Awards

One Mind launched the Rising Star Awards in 2005 under the fundamental principle that cutting edge, high-risk research would allow us to find the breakthroughs to accelerate cures for the neuropsychiatric illnesses that affect 1 in 4 people worldwide. Knowing that 90% of these conditions are treatable, we wanted to create a highly impactful grant that enables the researcher to think outside of the box and pursue research that might not otherwise be federally funded. Each One Mind Rising Star Award winner receives $300,000 over a three-year period to fund research for their studies, catalyzing innovation and encouraging collaboration and data sharing. Since 2005, One Mind has awarded 40 awards to some of the best and brightest early career brain scientists. Since receiving their awards, these researchers have gone on to make a significant impact, both in their studies and in the brain health community as a whole. One such awardee is 2010 Rising Star Award winner, Dr. Joshua Gordon, who now serves as the Director of the National Institute of Mental Health.

About COMPASS Pathways

COMPASS Pathways plc (Nasdaq: CMPS) is a mental health care company dedicated to accelerating patient access to evidence-based innovation in mental health. Our focus is on improving the lives of those who are suffering with mental health challenges and who are not helped by current treatments. We are pioneering the development of a new model of psilocybin therapy, in which our proprietary formulation of synthetic psilocybin, COMP360, is administered in conjunction with psychological support. COMP360 has been designated a Breakthrough Therapy by the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA), for treatment-resistant depression (TRD), and we have completed a phase IIb clinical trial of psilocybin therapy for TRD, in 22 sites across Europe and North America. This was the largest randomised, controlled, double-blind psilocybin therapy clinical trial ever conducted, and our topline data showed a statistically significant (p<0.001) and clinically relevant improvement in depressive symptom severity after three weeks for patients who received a single high dose of COMP360 psilocybin with psychological support. We are also running a phase II clinical trial of COMP360 psilocybin therapy for post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and anorexia nervosa. COMPASS is headquartered in London, UK, with offices in New York and San Francisco in the US. Our vision is a world of mental wellbeing. www.compasspathways.com

Contacts

Media:
DKC News, [email protected]