Education
PhD-University of Toronto
Background
Dr. Featherstone is currently an Assistant Professor in the Department of Psychiatry and the Behavioral Sciences at the University of Southern California. He received his Ph.D. in Psychology and Neuroscience from the University of Toronto in 2004. He then began a post-doctoral fellowship at the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health in Toronto, followed by a post-doctoral fellowship in industry (Sanofi-Aventis), both in preclinical Psychopharmacology. He then completed a post-doctoral fellowship at the University of Pennsylvania in the Department of Psychiatry, after which he accepted a faculty position at UPenn. Dr. Featherstone’s research has a strong focus on the etiology and treatment of mental illnesses, such as Schizophrenia and Depression, using translational models. While such models have been vitally important for understanding the biological mechanisms associated with psychiatric disease, and have served as useful tools for drug development, future progress in psychiatry is likely to increasingly depend on the emergence of researchers that have a solid grounding in both basic and clinical research. Dr. Featherstone will use the KL2 award to acquire the necessary expertise in clinical research which, in combination with his background in preclinical research, will allow him to become such a researcher.