(Boston)—Nikolaos P. Daskalakis, MD, PhD, professor of pharmacology, physiology & biophysics at Boston University Chobanian & Avedisian School of Medicine, has been awarded the XXIV “Vexillum G. Sciacca” International Award for Medical Research. The award ceremony, which took place September 26 at the Vatican, honored Daskalakis for his outstanding contribution to the field of neuropsychiatric and mental health research. This annual event honors young talents and individuals who have distinguished themselves in various sectors of civil society.
Daskalakis directs the school’s Neurogenomics and Translational Bioinformatics Laboratory (NG-TBL). He is also a professor of biomedical genetics in the department of medicine and a member of Boston University’s Center for Systems Neuroscience, Genome Science Institute and Hariri Institute for Computing and Computational Science & Engineering. In addition, he is an associate member of the Broad Institute and is affiliated with McLean Hospital / Harvard Medical School and the VA's National Center for PTSD.
Daskalakis’ research investigates the molecular, cellular and genomic pathways linking stress to brain function and dysfunction. NG-TBL uses functional genomics to distill genetic and epigenetic mechanisms into cell-type-specific regulatory elements that contribute to stress-related mental disorders such as PTSD. Translational studies using cell-culture and experimental models further validate and investigate causal genes and variants emerging from human genomics. The laboratory also employs large-scale datasets and machine-learning approaches to map genotype-to-phenotype relationships in complex neuropsychiatric traits, with the goal of understanding individual differences in symptom expression and resilience. NG-TBL’s overarching mission is to identify novel mechanisms and therapeutic targets for stress-related mental disorders.
Daskalakis co-leads the Systems Biology Working Group of the Psychiatric Genomics Consortium for PTSD and the PTSD BrainOmics Project of the PsychENCODE Consortium. He serves as an associate editor/guest editor for Biological Psychiatry, Brain Sciences, Neurobiology of Stress and multiple publications of the open access publisher Frontiers, including the journals Behavioral Neuroscience, Endocrinology, Neuroscience and Psychiatry.
Daskalakis received his MD with honors from the University of Athens and his PhD in neuropsychopharmacology from Leiden University in the Netherlands. He completed his postdoctoral research fellowships in clinical neuroendocrinology at Leiden University Medical Center and in systems biology at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai.