Janssen Pharmaceutica has committed $1.5 million to endow the Paul
Janssen Chair in Neuropsychopharmacology in the School of Medicine.
The gift commitment honors the companys 75-year-old founder,
and the new chair will be located in the Department of Psychiatry
and Behavioral Sciences.
The Paul Janssen Chair is a wonderful tribute to a man who
has been one of the most highly productive and widely esteemed pharmacological
researchers in the world for more than 45 years, said Charles
Nemeroff, Reunette W. Harris Professor and chair of psychiatry and
behavioral sciences.
It is gratifying to know that with the establishment of this
chair, the Janssen name will be linked forever to research in the
Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences at Emory,
he said.
The money will go to a department where researchers work at the
molecular, cellular and behavioral levels to understand how existing
psychotropic drugs affect the brain and to identify promising new
targets in the brain for future drugs.
They use a variety imaging equipment for both human and animal
studies of brain activity and response.
Departmental researchers in Emory Hospital also work in clinical
studies of patients suffering from mood and anxiety disorders, schizophrenia
and Alzheimers disease.
A leading area of research is the relationship of stress to mood
and anxiety disorders. The department is also recognized for its
studies of the neurobiological basis of schizophrenia and for the
psychiatric effects of drugs on nursing mothers and infants.
The Paul Janssen Chair is a very welcome commitment that
gives us the option of either recruiting or retaining a world-class
faculty researcher in psychiatry and behavioral sciences,
said Thomas Lawley, dean of the School of Medicine.
We are particularly dedicated to supporting cutting-edge
researchers who are actively involved in training graduate and medical
studentswho will, in their turn, populate the next generation
of investigators in this field, he said.
A renowned physician and chemist, Janssen founded the company that
bears his name in Belgium more than 30 years ago. It produces and
markets pharmaceuticals for use in psychiatry, neurology, dermatology
and several other areas.
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