Ramaris E. German, PhD Dr. Ramaris E. German is a clinical psychologist in the Neuroscience and Novel Therapeutics Unit. She has a broad range of clinical, research, and training experience working with children, families, and adults through her work at the University of Pennsylvania, American University, NYU-Bellevue Hospital Center, Washington DC VA Medical Center, Greenbelt Cares, and Neuropsychological Associates of Fairfax. Her research has focused on mechanisms in mood disorders, psychotherapy process and outcome research, as well as in the dissemination and implementation of evidence-based practices. As an immigrant from the Dominican Republic, Dr. German has a special interest in addressing diversity, inclusion, and inequity issues, health disparities, and stigma. Before joining NIMH, Dr. German worked training community mental health therapists in evidence-based practices, including cognitive behavioral therapy (in English and Spanish), to increase access to quality mental health services for underserved communities through a partnership between the Philadelphia Department of Behavioral Health and the University of Pennsylvania (the Beck Community Initiative). In her current work in the Neuroscience and Novel Therapeutics Unit and given her background in mood disorders, psychotherapy, and implementation research, Dr. German is currently involved in the research and development of novel psychotherapeutic treatments and interventions to target the underlying brain mechanisms implicated in severe irritability in youth with the aim to establish empirically-supported treatments for the underserved pediatric clinical population of youth with DMDD.

Lisa M. Cullins, MD Lisa M. Cullins, MD is an Attending Physician in the Emotion and Development Branch at the National Institute of Mental Health in Bethesda, MD. Dr. Cullins is an Adjunct Assistant Professor of Psychiatry, Behavioral Sciences and Pediatrics at George Washington University School of Medicine in Washington, DC. Dr. Cullins completed her Adult Psychiatry Residency at UCLA Neuropsychiatric Institute in Los Angeles, CA and her Child & Adolescent Psychiatry Fellowship at Columbia Presbyterian Hospital in New York City, NY. Dr. Cullins has devoted most of her career to training and education, community psychiatry and systems of care, in particular, working with children and adolescents in the child welfare system and other underserved populations. Dr. Cullins has had the privilege of being a physician leader and clinician educator in multiple treatment settings ranging from research, academic, tertiary care hospital facilities to one of the largest child community mental health providers in the State of California (Corporate Medical Director, EMQ Families First Children & Family Services). Throughout her career, Dr. Cullins has been a staunch advocate for quality and access to care for children and families and has been an active participant in the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry (AACAP) as current Co-Chair of the Diversity and Culture Committee, past Councilor At Large, past Chair of Task Force on Crisis in Recruitment into Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, past Co-Chair of the Workforce Committee, past Adoption and Foster Care Committee Member, past Secretary of Regional Organization, Child and Adolescent Psychiatry Society of Greater Washington (CAPSGW) and past Delegate of Regional Organization, Child and Adolescent Psychiatry Society of Greater Washington (CAPSGW) to the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry (AACAP) Assembly. Most recently, prior to Dr. Cullins’ current position at the National Institute of Health, she was the Training Director for the Child & Adolescent Psychiatry Fellowship Program and the Director of Outpatient Psychiatry at Children’s National Medical Center. During her role as Training Director, Dr. Cullins served as the Chair of the Child Caucus of the American Association of Directors of Psychiatry Residency Training (AADPRT).

Jamell White, PhD, LCSW-C, LICSW Dr. Jamell White is a staff clinician for the Neuroscience and Novel Therapeutics Unit (NNT) in the Emotion and Development Branch at the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH). Dr. White received her Ph.D. from the University of Maryland in Human Development and Quantitative Methodology. She also has master’s degrees in social work (Catholic University of America) and special education (Johns Hopkins University). Dr. White is a Clinical Assistant Professor of Psychiatry (Child and Adolescent) at Georgetown University School of Medicine as well as a Clinical Assistant Professor in the Department of Pediatrics at the George Washington University School of Medicine and Health Sciences. Prior to coming to the NIMH, much of Dr. White’s clinical work specialized in working with children, adolescents, and adults with Autism Spectrum Disorder and related disorders.

Lisa Felber, MSW, LICSW is a Licensed Clinical Social Worker and Staff Clinician for the Neuroscience and Novel Therapeutics Unit (NNT) in the Emotion and Development Branch at the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH). Ms. Felber received her Master’s in Social Work from the University of Maryland School of Social Work and did post-graduate training at the National Institutes of Health (NIH). Ms. Felber joined the Emotion and Development Branch in 2021. Prior to joining NIMH, Ms. Felber worked at the NIH Clinical Center where she provided clinical support to patients and families participating in COVID-19, sickle cell disease, and rare disease research studies. Ms. Felber also mentored and trained social workers and interns on issues related to pediatric and adult suicide risk screening and assessment. Ms. Felber has a strong interest in addressing access to care and health disparities among vulnerable populations. She has received several awards including the 2020 NIH Clinical Center CEO Award for COVID-19 Patient Care and the 2022 Hubert H. Humphrey Award For Service To America for her contributions to the health, safety, and well-being of our nation's most vulnerable children and families during Operation Artemis (OA) and Operation Allies Welcome (OAW).

Simone Haller, PhD Dr. Simone Haller is the Director of Research and Analytics in the Neuroscience and Novel Therapeutics Unit (NNT). She completed her DPhil at the University of Oxford in Experimental Psychology with a focus on adolescent development and individual differences. At NNT, Dr. Haller studies the cognitive, computational, and neural processes that children and adolescents engage to regulate negative affect and select actions, such as approaching or avoiding a peer provocation. Her research focuses on understanding how these processes (e.g., social threat processing) are shaped by development and individual differences in anxiety and irritability, and how they can be targeted in interventions for youth with clinically significant levels of anxiety and irritability. In September 2020, she received a two-year NARSAD Young Investigator Grant from the Brain and Behavior Research Foundation for her project "Predicting longitudinal psychiatric effects of the COVID-19 pandemic in a transdiagnostic sample of youth using rest and task-based fMRI."

Kyunghun Lee, PhD Dr. Lee is a scientist in the Neuroscience and Novel Therapeutics Unit (NNT) at the National Institute of Mental Health. Dr. Lee researched machine learning, software/hardware optimization, and automatic detection and classification system development while completing a PhD at the University of Maryland. After that, Dr. Lee worked as a postdoctoral fellow (Diagnostic Radiology and Nuclear Medicine) at the University of Maryland School of Medicine and focused on leveraging machine learning and computational modeling to understand the relationship between brain and behavior, leading to novel therapeutic concepts for brain disorders and brain-inspired A.I. As part of the NNT, Dr. Lee is working on computational analysis and software design in the lab and helping NIMH researchers in every phase of the automated software workflow to use neuroscience to identify treatment targets. Also, Dr. Lee is working on software/algorithm development based on real-time information from wearable devices.

Lauren Henry, PhD Dr. Lauren Henry (pronouns: she/her) is a post-doctoral IRTA fellow with the Neuroscience and Novel Therapeutics Unit (NNT) in the Emotion and Development Branch at the National Institute of Mental Health. She received her MS in psychology and PhD in clinical psychology with a minor in quantitative sciences from Vanderbilt University. She completed her pre-doctoral clinical psychology internship with the Charleston Consortium. Dr. Henry is interested in contributing to the prevention of psychopathology in children and adolescents. Her research focuses on leveraging technology to (1) investigate mechanisms of risk for psychopathology and (2) develop, evaluate, and implement preventive interventions for psychopathology for large-scale dissemination to improve public health. At the NNT, Dr. Henry is applying to her interests to a population of clinically impaired youth with irritability.