Neuroscience and Neurochemistry

Biography

Dr. Shenton’s primary appointment is as Professor in Psychiatry, Brigham and Women’s Hospital, and Director of the Psychiatry Neuroimaging Laboratory. This is a new position as of October 1, 2005. Prior to this time, her academic appointment, also at the professorial level, was in the Laboratory of Neuroscience, directed by Dr. Robert W. McCarley, VA Boston Healthcare System, where she was Professor (since 2000) and Director of the Clinical Neuroscience Division of the Laboratory of Neuroscience. Dr. Shenton began working with Dr. McCarley in 1984, and she began working in the Surgical Planning Laboratory with Drs. Ferenc Jolesz and Ron Kikinis in 1988. Drs. Shenton, McCarley, Kikinis, and Jolesz have been actively collaborating on brain structural anomalies in schizophrenia since 1988. In 2003, Dr. Shenton was also appointed as Professor of Radiology, Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Harvard Medical School.

Research Interest

Her interests include neuroimaging studies in schizophrenia and schizophrenia related disorders. She has also been involved in neuroimaging studies of post-traumatic stress disorder with colleagues Drs. Roger Pitman, Mark Gilbertson, and Arieh Shalev. More recently she is working with collaborators in Portugal on a project investigating brain abnormalities in William’s Syndrome patients. Since 1999, her research focus has also included diffusion tensor imaging of white matter fiber tracts in schizophrenia. Most recently she has been involved in a 10 Clinical Consortium Site on Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder and Traumatic Brain Injury that is funded through the Department of Defense.