DREVETS, Wayne C.

Scientific Vice President, Disease Area Leader in Mood Disorders
Neuroscience, Janssen Research & Development
Janssen Pharmaceutical Companies of Johnson & Johnson, Inc.
Professor (Adjunct), Laureate Institute for Brain Research

Wayne C. Drevets, M.D. is the Scientific Vice President and Disease Area Leader in Mood Disorders in the Neuroscience Therapeutic Area at Janssen Research & Development, of Johnson & Johnson, Inc. Dr. Drevets received a B.S. (Biology) degree from Wheaton College and an M.D. degree from the University of Kansas, and completed residency training in psychiatry at Washington University School of Medicine (St. Louis). He then joined the Washington University Department of Psychiatry faculty, ultimately attaining the rank of tenured Associate Professor, where he conducted positron emission tomography (PET) imaging studies of mood and anxiety disorders under the mentorship of Dr. Marcus Raichle. He subsequently moved to the University of Pittsburgh, where he acquired additional training in the application of PET to neuroreceptor imaging. In 2001, Dr. Drevets joined the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) Mood and Anxiety Disorders Program as Chief of the Section on Neuroimaging in Mood and Anxiety Disorders, and in 2008 he additionally became Acting Chief of the NIMH Laboratory on Molecular Pathophysiology. In 2009 Dr. Drevets became the first President and Scientific Director of the Laureate Institute for Brain Research in Tulsa, OK, a private research institute founded and supported by The William K. Warren Foundation, to lead a multidisciplinary team in studies aimed at investigating interrelationships between neuroimaging, genetic and other biomarkers, illness course, and treatment outcome in psychiatric disorders. He subsequently joined Janssen in the fall of 2012.

Dr. Drevets has published 260 articles and chapters that have been cumulatively cited more than 400,000 times in the scientific literature (Web of Science Citation Report). His research has been funded by project and career development grants from the National Institute for Mental Health, the Oklahoma Center for the Advancement of Science and Technology, the Stanley Medical Research Institute, the William K. Warren Foundation, and other private foundations. Dr. Drevets is a past recipient of Young Investigator and Independent Investigator Awards from the National Alliance for Research on Schizophrenia and Depression (NARSAD), and is listed in the Best Doctors in America. He is a Fellow of the American College of Neuropsychopharmacology, and also is a Member of the Society for Neuroscience and the Society for Biological Psychiatry. He serves on the Editorial Board for the journal, Biology of Mood and Anxiety Disorders, and on the Scientific Boards for Brain & Behavior Research Foundation, and the MRC Behavioral & Clinical Neuroscience Centre at Cambridge University.

Major themes of Dr. Drevets studies have involved: 1) characterizing the pathophysiology of mood disorders using multimodal neuroimaging technologies; 2) delineating neural circuits in which dysfunction is associated with major depressive episodes; 3) elucidating effects of genetic variants associated with the risk for mood disorders on neural function, structure and receptor pharmacology; 4) investigating the neural mechanisms of antidepressant and mood stabilizing treatments, and 5) developing novel therapeutics for mood disorders.

ABSTRACT

17:00-18:30 5 NOVEMBER
thematic SESSION i.B: mapping the brain, unlocking the mind

For more than two millennia physicians have longed to understand the physical underpinnings of melancholia and mania. In recent decades a rapid expansion in knowledge has occurred about the brain circuits that process and regulate emotional behavior, and in which abnormalities of neural function and structure associate with mood disorders.  These discoveries especially have been enabled by the development of functional and molecular brain mapping technologies and refinements in post mortem histopathological and gene expression assessments. Knowledge about the neural circuits underlying the pathophysiology of depression is beginning to guide the development of novel antidepressant treatments. In addition, emerging evidence indicates that distinct subtypes of depression may be differentiated based on patterns of abnormal activity within the brain circuits that support emotional processing.