Commitees

Professor Jerome Sarris is Professor of Integrative Mental Health and Deputy Director of the NICM integrative medicine research institute at Western Sydney University. He holds an NHMRC Clinical Research Fellowship, in addition to an honorary position at the University of Melbourne, Department of Psychiatry as a Principal Research Fellow. Jerome moved from clinical practice as a Naturopath, Nutritionist, and Acupuncturist to academic work, and completed a doctorate at the field of psychiatry. He has a particular interest in anxiety and mood disorder research pertaining to integrative medicine, nutraceutical psychopharmacology and psychotropic plant medicines, and lifestyle medicine. His research also utilises genomic technology to examine the pharmacogenomics of individual responses to nutraceuticals in the treatment of psychiatric disorders.

CAPT Joseph R. Hibbeln, MD, NIH, Bethesda, USA

Dr Natalie Parletta, is a Senior Research Fellow at the University of South Australia and a practising Dietitian/Nutritionist at the Centre for Health and Wellbeing in Adelaide. For over 10 years her research has focussed on links between nutrition and mental health, including clinical trials investigated the effects of omega-3 fatty acids on learning and behaviour in children with ADHD and learning difficulties, cognition and mood in elderly people, and more recently the effects of the Mediterranean diet on mental health. She has completed a pilot study of the Mediterranean diet in people with serious mental illness, and more recently one of the first randomised controlled trials in people with depression.

Prof Julia Rucklidge is a Professor of Clinical Psychology in the Department of Psychology at the University of Canterbury, Christchurch, New Zealand and Director of the Mental Health and Nutrition Research Group

Julia investigates the role of micronutrients in the expression and treatment of psychiatric symptoms, including ADHD, Bipolar Disorder, and anxiety, stress and PTSD associated with the Canterbury earthquakes

Scott Teasdale, University of NSW, Australia

Dr Alan Logan obtained his Doctorate from the fully-accredited Canadian College of Naturopathic Medicine where he graduated as valedictorian. For the last decade he has been an invited faculty member within the mind-body medicine courses offered at Harvard’s School of Continuing Medical Education. Here, he presents on nutrition and mental health, as well as natural environments in the context of health promotion. He contributed to Harvard School of Public Health’s recent Natural Environments Initiative position statement, and is a co-author within the upcoming Oxford Textbook of Nature and Public Health (Oxford University Press).

With a commitment to the scientific exploration of biopsychosocial influences in health, and a 14-year history of writing academic articles co-authored by university-based physicians and scientists, his background is such that collaboration is the rule, not the exception. Alan has been published in over 2-dozen diverse scientific/medical journals, ranging from Aquatic Biosystems and Beneficial Microbes, to Lancet Psychiatry and Pathophysiology. His focus has been on nutrition, microbiota, and natural environments, particularly as they pertain to mental health. He is co-author of Your Brain on Nature (Harper Collins, 2012).

Alan Logan obtained his Doctorate from the fully-accredited Canadian College of Naturopathic Medicine where he graduated as valedictorian. For the last decade he has been an invited faculty member within the mind-body medicine courses offered at Harvard’s School of Continuing Medical Education. Here, he presents on nutrition and mental health, as well as natural environments in the context of health promotion. He contributed to Harvard School of Public Health’s recent Natural Environments Initiative position statement, and is a co-author within the upcoming Oxford Textbook of Nature and Public Health (Oxford University Press).

With a commitment to the scientific exploration of biopsychosocial influences in health, and a 14-year history of writing academic articles co-authored by university-based physicians and scientists, his background is such that collaboration is the rule, not the exception. Alan has been published in over 2-dozen diverse scientific/medical journals, ranging from Aquatic Biosystems and Beneficial Microbes, to Lancet Psychiatry and Pathophysiology. His focus has been on nutrition, microbiota, and natural environments, particularly as they pertain to mental health. He is co-author of Your Brain on Nature (Harper Collins, 2012).

Sarah Dash is a PhD Candidate within the School of Medicine at Deakin University, Australia. Sarah’s research focuses on the link between diet and depression, specifically the biological pathways that may mediate this relationship.

She is an active member and administrator for the ISNPR, and a CRC for Mental Health scholarship recipient.

Samantha Dawson is a PhD Candidate within the School of Medicine at Deakin University, and she is hosted by the Murdoch Childrens Research Institute.

She has a Masters in Human Nutrition and is passionate about maternal and early life nutrition. Her PhD research targets the prenatal diet to improve maternal and infant gut health.

Chair of Scientific Committee

Professor Kuan-Pin Su, Psychiatry & Neural and Cognitive Sciences | Director of Mind-Body Interface Laboratory (MBI-Lab) | China Medical University & Hospital TAIWAN | Honorary Faculty of Institute of Psychiatry-King’s College London UK

As depression is heterogenous and every antidepressant treatment only has modest effect, we colleagues at the Mind-Body Interface Laboratory (MBI-Lab) explore novel treatments and unknown biological mechanisms for depression

Dr Yutaka Matsuoka is a Chief of Division of Health Care Research, Center for Public Health Sciences, National Cancer Center Japan. He is a Vice President of ISNPR and Executive Director of Japan Supportive, Palliative and Psychosocial Oncology Group (J-SUPPORT).

He is engaged in an effort to create a new academic area that becomes a bridge between nutrition, behavior and mental health. He investigates the role of n-3 polyunsaturated fatty acids in the prevention and treatment of depression and anxiety among physically-ill patients, such as those with cancer, accidental injury, or cardiovascular disease. His research findings have been published in the area of clinical psychiatry, psychosomatic medicine, psychiatric epidemiology, biological psychiatry and clinical neuroscience.

Dr. David Mischoulon graduated in 1994 from the combined MD-PhD program at Boston University School of Medicine. He earned a PhD in biochemistry during this time, and authored several original papers in the area of liver biochemistry. He completed an internship in General Medicine at Carney Hospital in 1995. He then entered the Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) Adult Psychiatry Residency Training Program, from which he graduated in 1998, after serving as Chief Resident in Psychopharmacology. Dr. Mischoulon is an Associate Professor of Psychiatry at Harvard Medical School, and Director of Research and Alternative Remedy Studies at the Depression Clinical and Research Program of the MGH.

Dr. Mischoulon’s research has focused on various areas of depression, including complementary and alternative medicine. He is also an accredited medical acupuncturist and has carried out studies of acupuncture as a treatment for depression. He has received two NARSAD Young Investigator awards, a K-23 award from NCCAM, an R01 grant from the NIH to study omega-3 fatty acids for depression, and recently a UG3 from NCCIH to continue his work on omega-3 fatty acids for depression. Dr. Mischoulon has mentored many research fellows and junior faculty, including investigators from Europe, Asia, and Australia, who have gone on to obtain independent funding as principal investigators.

A/Prof Zoltan Sarnyai is Associate Professor and Head of Laboratory of Psychiatric Neuroscience at James Cook University, Townsville, Australia. Zoltan’s research aims to find effective and safe biological treatment (e.g., therapeutic diets) suitable for the treatment of psychosis and depression, using animal models and translational approaches.

Dr. Katzman is the Clinic Director and Staff Psychiatrist at the S.T.A.R.T. Clinic (Stress, Trauma, Anxiety, Rehabilitation and Treatment) for Mood and Anxiety Disorders. He is also a faculty member at the Northern Ontario School of Medicine (Laurentian University and Lakehead University) as well as in the Department of Psychiatry at the University of Toronto. He is also appointed in the Department of Psychology at Lakehead University and is a member of the Faculty of Psychology at Adler School of Professional Studies.

Dr. Katzman is also a founding member of the Board of Directors as well as the founding and current Chair of the Scientific Advisory Board of the Anxiety Disorders Association of Canada/Association Canadienne des Troubles Anxieux (ADAC/ACTA). He is the chair of a variety of scientific advisory boards, on the editorial board for a number of journals, and has published numerous papers in the areas of Anxiety, Mood, Pain and Attention Disorders.

The focus of his research has been related to Hypoprefrontality, Executive Dysfunction, Intolerance of Uncertainty and Low Hedonic Tone in relation to the development of a variety of comorbidities in association with treatment resistance.

A/Prof Vicent Balanza Martinez, University Hospital Doctor Peset, University of Valencia, CIBERSAM, Valencia, Spain

I’m interested in the role of Omega-3 fatty acids in mood disorders, from a clinical staging perspective

Dr Daisuke Nishi, National Center of Neurology and Psychiatry, Japan

My focus is the prevention of common mental disorders such as depression and PTSD, particularly with the use of omega-3 fatty acids