Who was on the Commission?
Between its creation in 2016 and the end of the first phase of work in 2018, the Neuroscience Project was supported by a commission of experts from the worlds of psychiatry, neuroscience and health education.
In July 2018, oversight of the Neuroscience Project was taken over by the newly-formed RCPsych Neuroscience Board.
Professor Wendy Burn works part-time in a community post as a Consultant Old Age Psychiatrist in Leeds in West Yorkshire.
Her service is responsible for many patients with dementia at all stages of the illness as well as elderly people with a range of psychiatric problems and she is a Clinical Lead for Dementia in the Yorkshire Strategic Clinical Network.
She has held many roles in the organisation and delivery of postgraduate training, including establishing the Yorkshire School of Psychiatry of which she was the first Head. On behalf of the Royal College of Psychiatrists she has been an Examiner, Regional Coordinator for CPD and the Deputy Lead for National Recruitment.
She was Dean of the College from 2011 to 2016, and was elected President of the College in 2017.
Andrew Brittlebank is Specialist Adviser for Curriculum for the Royal College of Psychiatrists and Vice President for Training for the European Board of Psychiatry.
After training in Psychiatry, Dr Brittlebank became a Clinical Lecturer at Newcastle University before taking up a consultant post in a rural area of Northumberland; he is currently Medical Director of Cumbria Partnership NHS Foundation Trust.
He holds a Master’s degree in Management and Leadership and has researched and published a number of original articles on performance assessment, quality assurance and other medical educational topics.
Ed Bullmore is Deputy Director of the Wellcome Trust/GSK-funded training programme in Translational Medicine and Therapeutics, Clinical Director of the Wellcome Trust/MRC-funded Behavioural & Clinical Neuroscience Institute, and an honorary Consultant Psychiatrist and Director of R&D in Cambridgeshire & Peterborough Foundation NHS Trust.
His research career initially centred on mathematical analysis of neurophysiological time series.
After moving to Cambridge as Professor of Psychiatry in 1999, his interest in human brain function and structure increasingly focused on complex brain networks identified in MRI and other brain scanning data.
His recent methodological work has focused on graph theory to measure aspects of brain network topology. He has been elected as a Fellow of the Royal College of Physicians, the Royal College of Psychiatrists, and the Academy of Medical Sciences.
Sarah Caddick is Neuroscience Adviser to Lord Sainsbury of Turville and his charitable organisation, the Gatsby Charitable Foundation.
She is a neuroscientist who has held leadership roles in academia and private/public grant-making organisations where she has been responsible for the development, oversight and restructuring of strategic, programmatic, operational and grant-making activities across a broad range of scientific disciplines.
She currently serves on a number of boards, including the Global Council for Brain Research (World Economic Forum), the Science Museum (London) and WiredDifferently.org. She is a former guest curator and presenter for TEDGlobal and the Skoll World Forum.
Ian Curran is the Assistant Director of Education and Professional Standards at the General Medical Council, where he leads policy development and quality assurance of UK postgraduate medical education and training.
Previously, Professor Curran worked at Barts Healthcare NHS Trust where he was a consultant anaesthetist with a special interest in chronic pain management.
He was Clinical Academic Group Director of Education & Workforce at Barts, Senior Examiner for Medical Finals at Barts School of Medicine and Dentistry and made Professor of Innovation and Excellence in Healthcare Education at Queen Mary University of London.
He has also been a clinical adviser to the Department of Health, NHS England and NHS Health Education England. He is a Harvard Macy Scholar and visiting member of faculty.
Jacky Hayden was Dean of Postgraduate Medical Studies Health Education England, working across the North West, having led the integration of the two former deaneries.
Her clinical background was in General Practice and she was the first General Practitioner in England to be appointed to the position of Postgraduate Dean.
She was awarded the CBE in 2013 for her services to medical education, received an honorary doctorate of science (medicine) from St George’s Hospital Medical School University of London in 2013 and was one of the HSJ’s Top Fifty Inspirational Women in Health.
Eileen Joyce is a Professor of Neuropsychiatry at The Institute of Neurology, University College London.
Professor Joyce obtained her first degree in experimental psychology and PhD in dopamine psychopharmacology from the University of Cambridge, before studying medicine. She trained in psychiatry at the Bethlem and Maudsley Hospitals.
Eileen’s current research focuses on interventions for neuropsychiatric disorders such as schizophrenia, OCD and Tourette’s syndrome and their mechanisms of action.
Her clinic work includes the management of complex neuropsychiatric disorders such as conversion disorder, Parkinson’s disease and epilepsy. She is Chair of the Faculty of Neuropsychiatry, Royal College of Psychiatrists and sits on the MRC Clinical Training and Career Development Panel.
Jeffrey A. Lieberman is Professor and Chair, Department of Psychiatry at the Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons, Director of the New York State Psychiatric Institute, and Psychiatrist-in-Chief of the New York Presbyterian Hospital-Columbia University Medical Centre.
His career has focused on research and clinical care of people with severe mental illness including psychotic and mood disorders. In 2000, he was elected to the National Academy of Sciences Institute of Medicine
Professor Lieberman's work has extended into public policy and advocacy for enhancing awareness of mental illness and improving mental health care, as well as diminishing stigma. He was President of the American Psychiatric Association in 2013-2014.
Anne Lingford-Hughes is Professor of Addiction Biology at Imperial College London. She is also a Consultant Psychiatrist with a particular interest in pharmacological treatments of alcohol problems and comorbidity at Central North West London NHS Foundation Trust.
Her research has focused on using PET and fMRI neuroimaging and neuropharmacological challenges to characterise the neurobiology of addiction, particularly alcoholism and opiate dependence though more recently cocaine addiction and pathological gambling.
Her research aims to improve treatment for addiction by understanding vulnerability to relapse and to optimise use of adjunctive pharmacotherapy.
Anne has contributed to NICE guidance and the addiction guidelines from the British Association for Psychopharmacology, and she is currently Chair of the Academic Faculty of the Royal College of Psychiatrists.
Mary-Ellen Lynall is a trainee psychiatrist in the NHS East of England deanery. She studied Natural Sciences (neuroscience) at the University of Cambridge before commencing her medical studies at the University of Oxford.
She continued her medical training as an Academic Neurosciences Foundation doctor and is currently an Academic Clinical Fellow in Psychiatry at the University of Cambridge.
She teaches neuroscience to undergraduates and is co-author of the textbook ‘Lecture Notes in Psychiatry.’
Her research, supervised by Professor Ed Bullmore and Dr Menna Clatworthy, focuses on the role of the immune system in the link between psychological stress and psychiatric disorders.
Professor Ross has spent his entire career at Yale University, receiving his MD and PhD degrees, then completing his residency in 2009, before becoming Associate Program Director – a role that he has continued ever since.
He is Co-Founder and Co-Chair of the National Neuroscience Curriculum Initiative, and his main area of academic interest is the design of innovative educational resources, rooted in principles of adult learning that can easily be disseminated to remote sites.
His numerous awards include the American Psychiatric Association Irma Bland Award for Excellence in Teaching Residents, the Association for Academic Psychiatry Early Career Development Award, and he was an inaugural recipient of the Yale University Rosenkranz Award for Pedagogical Innovation.
Simon Wessely has been a consultant liaison psychiatrist at King’s College Hospital and the Maudsley Hospital since 1991 where he is now Chair of Psychological Medicine at the Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology and Neurosciences (IoPPN).
He established the first clinical trials unit in the UK dedicated to mental health, set up the King’s Centre for Military Health Research and acted as Civilian Consultant Advisor in Psychiatry to the British Army visiting the armed forces in Bosnia, Iraq and Afghanistan.
His work has had a direct impact on public policy and on forms of treatment and help for service personnel. He was elected President of the Royal College of Psychiatrists in 2014.