# Patient Oriented Research and Mentorship and Training in Functional Neuroimaging of Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder

> **NIH NIH K24** · YALE UNIVERSITY · 2021 · $181,029

## Abstract

ABSTRACT
 This K24 Mid-Career Investigator Career Development Award seeks support for training and mentorship for
Christopher Pittenger, MD, Ph.D., a well-established, tenured Associate Professor in Psychiatry at Yale University, Director
of the Yale OCD Research Clinic, and Assistant Chair for Translational Research in the Department of Psychiatry. Dr.
Pittenger leads a robust patient-oriented research (POR) research program, which is integrated with his
basic/translational lab-based research and has produced important new insights into the neurobiological underpinnings
and novel treatment avenues for obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) and Tourette syndrome (TS). Dr. Pittenger has a
long-standing commitment to mentorship; most notably, he is Co-Director of the Neuroscience Research Training
Program (NRTP), the research track within the Yale psychiatry residency.
 The training plan supported by this grant will allow Dr. Pittenger to increase his skills in quantitative analysis, with a
focus on advanced statistical methods and on the design and analysis of fMRI studies. These are areas in which he already
has active research with expert collaborators; the aim of the proposed training plan is to enhance his own proficiency to
make him a more effective collaborator and mentor in these important domains. Additional training is focused on his
own abilities as a mentor and leader, with the goal of increasing his efficacy in the management of his own research
groups and in effective and individualized mentorship. These training activities will take place in the context of two NIMH-
funded research studies. The first, R01 MH116038, is a recently funded grant on which Dr. Pittenger is co-PI with his close
collaborator Alan Anticevic and deploys cutting-edge imaging technology and data analysis approaches to examine brain
network connectivity parallels and predictors of therapeutic response to pharmacotherapy in OCD. The second, R01
MH100068, is a grant with collaborator Michelle Hampson that is developing real-time fMRI neurofeedback as a probe
and potential treatment for OCD, with promising early results. These two exciting projects provide a fruitful vehicle for
the proposed training in statistics and neuroimaging.
 Dr. Pittenger will devote substantial time to mentoring under this award. One major focus will be the NRTP; the plan
is for him to take over as Director of this program over the next few years, and to take the lead in the next resubmission
of our T32 grant in 2022. Support of this increased mentorship effort is a second major motivation for the current
application. Dr. Pittenger will also provide mentorship to students, postdocs, and junior faculty in his own research
program and throughout the Department of Psychiatry
 Together, these integrated plans for training, research, and mentorship will support a well-established mid-career
investigator whose robust research program is producing important insights into the neurobiology and treatmen...

## Key facts

- **NIH application ID:** 10087006
- **Project number:** 5K24MH121571-02
- **Recipient organization:** YALE UNIVERSITY
- **Principal Investigator:** Christopher John Pittenger
- **Activity code:** K24 (R01, R21, SBIR, etc.)
- **Funding institute:** NIH
- **Fiscal year:** 2021
- **Award amount:** $181,029
- **Award type:** 5
- **Project period:** 2020-02-01 → 2024-12-31

## Primary source

NIH RePORTER: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/10087006

## Citation

> US National Institutes of Health, RePORTER application 10087006, Patient Oriented Research and Mentorship and Training in Functional Neuroimaging of Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder (5K24MH121571-02). Retrieved via AI Analytics 2026-05-22 from https://api.ai-analytics.org/grant/nih/10087006. Licensed CC0.

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