Putting It All Together: Kyle Lapidus, MD, PhD Arrives at Stony Brook to Conduct Translational Research

Kyle Lapidus, MD, PhD

September 30, 2014 - Kyle Lapidus, MD, PhD has been appointed Assistant Professor and Director of Neuromodulation in the Department of Psychiatry at Stony Brook University. “Dr. Lapidus will add a new dimension to the department’s translational research program,” said department chair Ramin Parsey, MD, PhD. “He has the scientific background to conduct pre-clinical research as well as the clinical training and experience to introduce novel treatments.”

Dr. Lapidus graduated magna cum laude with a bachelor of arts in biology, specializing in neurobiology, from Harvard University before entering the Medical Scientist Training Program at Albert Einstein College of Medicine. After earning his medical degree and a PhD in Anatomy and Structural Biology, Dr. Lapidus completed a residency in Psychiatry at Mount Sinai School of Medicine. He was the Research Chief Resident and received a National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) Outstanding Resident Award. He also worked in Israel at Shalvata Medical Center studying deep transcranial magnetic stimulation before signing on as an Assistant Professor in Psychiatry and Neuroscience at Mount Sinai for the past two years.

Dr. Lapidus is the principal investigator on several grants, including a NARSAD Young Investigator Award to study oxidative stress biomarkers predicting the efficacy of ketamine for the treatment of depression and a NIMH Career Development Award to investigate oxidative stress biomarkers in anhedonia and major depression. His resume includes 22 peer-reviewed journal articles, 3 book chapters and 17 invited presentations.

Dr. Lapidus’s goal at Stony Brook is to conduct translational research: investigating the biological bases of disease and testing new and innovative treatments. He will conduct research using MRI and Magnetic Resonance Spectroscopy (MRS), EEG, biochemical assays, and animal genetics. He plans to conduct clinical trials of pharmaceuticals and device-based treatments such as transcranial magnetic stimulation, ECT and transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS). Clinically, he plans to perform psychiatric consultations and provide novel therapies for treatment-resistant mood and anxiety disorders.

Like many translational researchers, Dr. Lapidus’s current work echoes his academic development. “I started with a basic science focus,” Dr. Lapidus said, “and my interest in medicine and psychiatry grew when I became aware of how critical the clinical element is for biomedical research. My mother was a psychologist and my father was a physicist, so I grew up with an interest in mind-brain science. I have a broad range of interests and am now ready to put everything together.”