Schizophrenia is a devastating and heritable neurodevelopmental disorder that impacts around 1 in 100 people worldwide, leaving an immense burden on individuals, families, and society writ large. How do we reconcile emerging data about the genetic causes of schizophrenia with changes in the brain that often emerge around adolescence? How can clinical systems better treat individuals with schizophrenia? In this talk, we will take a deep dive into the basic science and treatment guidelines for this and related psychiatric disorders.

Arpiar “Arpy” Saunders, Ph.D., is Assistant Scientist, Vollum Institute at OHSU. He did his doctoral and postdoctoral training at Harvard Medical School before joining OHSU in 2020. In 2023, Dr. Saunders received the prestigious Rising Star Award from the One Mind Foundation, recognizing his innovative work in developing novel brain mapping technologies to study synaptic “rewiring” that might occur in animal models carrying gene mutations recently associated with schizophrenia.

George Keepers, M.D., is Elda V. Carruthers Professor and Chair of Psychiatry at OHSU. Dr. Keepers is the Chair of the American Psychiatric Association’s writing group that published the most recent edition of the Schizophrenia Treatment Guideline.