Dr. Ruth Lanius appointed to National Institutes of Health

The Center for Scientific Review at the National Institutes of Health (NIH) has announced Dr. Ruth Lanius will serve as a member of the Biobehavioral Mechanisms of Emotion, Stress and Health (MESH) Study Section for a three year term starting July 1, 2008. Lanius is an associate professor in the Department of Psychiatry at the Schulich School of Medicine & Dentistry, and holds the Harris-Woodman Chair in Psyche and Soma.

Dr. Toni Scarpa, the Director of the Center for Scienfic Review, says members are selected on the basis of their demonstrated competence and achievement in their scientific discipline as evidenced by the quality of research accomplishments, publications in scientific journals and other significant scientific activities and honours. "Service on a study section also requires mature judgement and objectivity as well as the ability to work effectively in a group, qualities we believe Dr. Lanius will bring to this important task," he added. Study sections review grant applications submitted to the NIH, make recommendations on these applications, and survey the status of research in their fields of science.

Dr. Lanius is a world-renowned leader in the study of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. She graduated from the University of British Columbia with a combined M.D. and Ph.D. in neuroscience in 1996, and continued her training at The University of Western Ontario where she specialized in psychiatry. She says, "I wanted to combine my interest in neuroscience with my clinical interest and learn more about what happens in the brain when people have been traumatized, and how through therapy, we could rewire some of that brain circuitry."