The personnel of the Mood and Personality Disorders Research Program at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai contribute immeasurably to the successful operations of our research studies.
Faculty
Harold W. Koenigsberg, MD
Professsor | Psychiatry
Director, Mood and Personality Disorders Program
Dr. Koenigsberg is Professor of Psychiatry at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai and Director of the Mood and Personality Disorders Program at Mount Sinai. A principal focus of Dr. Koenigsberg’s research is the interrelationship between neurobiological, psychological and social contributors to personality and its disorders. He has been awarded 17 years of continuous funding as principal investigator, having been awarded six National Institute of Mental Health R01 research grants. Dr. Koenigsberg’s current work focuses on mood regulation, social cognitive neuroscience, and in the psychobiology and treatment of borderline, avoidant, and schizotypal personality disorders. He is an author of two books on borderline personality disorder, one of which has been published in seven languages. He has published widely on the neurobiology, phenomenology, and treatment of borderline personality disorder, and has also published on the psychobiology of depression, anxiety disorders, and schizotypal personality disorder. Dr. Koenigsberg is a Distinguished Life Fellow of the American Psychiatric Association and a Fellow of the American College of Neuropsychopharmacology. He served as an advisor to the Personality Disorders task forces of both the DSM-IV and DSM-5 diagnostic systems of the American Psychiatric Association. He is a member of the editorial board of the Journal of Personality Disorders and has served on the Scientific Program Committee of the Society for Biological Psychiatry. Dr. Koenigsberg is a member of the board of directors of the International Society for the Study of Personality Disorders. He co-chaired the 11th International Congress of the International Society for the Study of Personality Disorders. In addition to his medical degree, Dr. Koenigsberg holds an MA in Physics from Columbia University.
Marianne S. Goodman, MD
Professor | Psychiatry
Dr. Marianne Goodman is a full time VA clinical research physician at the James J Peters VA (JJPVA) for 26 years, and Director of the VISN 2 MIRECC and clinical researcher in suicide prevention and novel treatment development. She has been the PI on multiple funded studies examining the biology and treatment of dysregulated emotion including treatment of anger and aggression in personality disorders (VA Advanced Career Development Award, 2006-2009), treatment of suicidality in Veterans, (PI on a large 5-year Dept. of Defense funded randomized clinical trial of DBT in high-risk suicidal Veterans, 2009-2014) and novel approaches to diminishing suicide risk with safety planning in adolescents, families and high risk individuals (HHC pilot study 2014-2015; VA RR&D SPiRE grant 2015-2017; RR&D MERIT 2017-2019). She is developer of the Project Life Force (PLF) intervention, a manualized group safety planning + skills intervention that is now being disseminated nationally across the VA system. Adaptations of PLF for college students, geriatric populations and Army personnel are currently underway.
Erin A. Hazlett, PhD
Professor | Psychiatry and Neuroscience
Dr. Hazlett is Director of the Cognitive Psychophysiology Laboratory and a Professor in the Departments of Psychiatry and Neuroscience. She is also a Senior Research Career Scientist at the James J. Peters VA Medical Center (an affiliate of ISMMS). Her main research interests focus on the use of psychophysiology and magnetic resonance imaging to identify neurobiological mechanisms underlying serious mental illness and their translational importance. At the JJPVA, Dr. Hazlett conducts research on the neurobiology of suicidal behavior in Veterans. Dr. Hazlett is a principal investigator on grants from the NIMH, the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs, and the Department of Defense. She has received Young Investigator and Independent Investigator Awards from the Brain and Behavior Research Foundation (formerly NARSAD). Her work has been featured on the cover of three high-impact international journals (Biological Psychiatry, The American Journal of Psychiatry, and Brain Research). Professor Hazlett is a member of the Association for Psychological Research, Society for Psychophysiological Research, and the Society for Research in Psychopathology. She is on several editorial boards and federal grant review panels.
Margaret M. McClure, PhD
Assistant Professor | Psychiatry
Dr. McClure is a clinical psychologist with expertise in clinical neuropsychology, assessment, and serious mental illness. She earned a Ph.D. in Clinical Psychology from Fordham University, did her predoctoral clinical internship at the James J. Peters VA Medical Center, and completed a post-doctoral fellowship at Icahn School of Medicine at Mt. Sinai. She is an Assistant Professor in the Psychiatry Department at ISMMS, and she also holds a faculty appointment at Fairfield University in Fairfield, CT, where she is a Professor of Psychological & Brain Sciences and Associate Vice Provost for Research.
Dr. McClure studies schizophrenia spectrum and personality disorders, specifically understanding the widespread functional impairment, including the cognitive correlates, of schizophrenia and personality disorder patients, as well as evaluating interventions to reduce disability. Dr. McClure also studies the long-term impact of childhood trauma and its relationship to dating violence in college students. She is the author of over 40 peer-reviewed journal articles and more than 50 academic conference presentations, and she and her colleagues are the recipients of over $15 million in grant funding. She also supervised dozens of post-doctoral fellows and post-graduate researchers, and over 75 undergraduate psychology majors over the course of her career.
Mercedes Perez-Rodriguez, MD, PhD
Assistant Professor | Psychiatry
Dr. Perez is Assistant Professor of Psychiatry and Assistant Training Director for Research in the Department of Psychiatry at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai. She is the Medical Director of the Psychosis Research Integrating Science and Medicine (PRISM) Program. Her work, funded by the NIH and the Brain and Behavior Research Foundation (NARSAD), aims to elucidate the biological underpinnings of psychosis spectrum and personality disorders and test novel treatments through cutting-edge clinical trials, with a focus on cognition and social cognition. Dr. Perez has authored or co-authored over 100 publications, including more than 70 papers in peer-reviewed journals and 15 book chapters, and has made more than 60 presentations at national and international meetings. Dr. Perez is a Fellow Member of the American Psychiatric Association and an Associate Member of the American College of Neuropsychopharmacology (ACNP). She has served in several administrative leadership positions including the National Advisory Mental Health Council Workgroup on Tasks and Measures for RDoC (Research Domain Criteria) at the NIMH; the Innovations Working Group and the Biomarkers Working Group at the International Society for Central Nervous System Clinical Trials Methodology (ISCTM); and the Membership Task Force committee at The American College of Neuropsychopharmacology (ACNP). Dr. Perez is an elected member of the board of directors of the American Society of Hispanic Psychiatry.
Antonia S. New, MD
Professor | Psychiatry
Dr. New is Professor, Residency Training Director, and Vice Chair for Education in the Department of Psychiatry at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai. Dr. New has a longstanding career as a funded principal investigator studying the neurobiology of borderline personality disorder. Her research focus is on emotion dysregulation and emotional interoception abnormalities in borderline personality disorder, symptom domains which underlie some of the interpersonal difficulties encountered in this disorder. In addition, Dr. New explores individual differences in response to stress and trauma, focusing on how this relates to emotion regulation. She uses brain imaging techniques, genetic studies, and laboratory assessment of behavior to explore neural circuitry and mechanisms of treatment response in BPD.
Daniel R. Rosell, MD, PhD
Assistant Professor | Psychiatry
Dr. Rosell is Assistant Professor of Psychiatry at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai. His principal interests include brain imaging, neural networks, system neuroscience, and the personality disorders. He has conducted PET and fMRI imaging research in the personality disorders and has studied the neural underpinnings of impulsive aggression in the personality disorders.
Research Coordinators
Brian Kang, BA
Olivia Berin, BA
Collaborating Investigators
Bryan T. Denny, PhD. Associate Professor of Psychology, Rice University
Anissa Abi-Dargham, MD. Professor and Vice Chair for Research, Stony Brook University
Kevin N Ochsner, Ph.D. Professor of Psychology, Columbia University
Daniella Schiller, Ph.D. , Associate Professor of Neuroscience and Psychiatry, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai
Mark Slifstein, Ph.D., Professor of Psychiatry, Stony Brook University