Research Grants

Grant Number: NIH R01 MH133840

Project period: 2025-2030

Studying brain network dynamics to understand the underlying mechanisms of various psychiatric disorders.

PI: Dr. Xi Zhu | Lab Role: PI

Grant Number: U.S.-Israel Binational Science Foundation (BSF)

Project period: 2026-2030

This project introduces a novel neuro-digital framework–from brain biomarkers to digital phenotyping–to address MDD heterogeneity.

MPI: Dr. Xi Zhu, Dr. Sigal Zilcha-Mano (University of Haifa) | Lab Role: MPI (Dr. Zhu)

Grant Number: NIH R01 MH131532

Project period: 2022-2027

Using novel virtual reality tasks to identify neural mechanisms of discrimination learning in PTSD.

PI: Dr. Benjamin Suarez-Jimenez (Univ. of Rochester) | Lab Role: Site-PI (Dr. Zhu)

Grant Number: NIH R01 MH13856901

Project period: 2025-2030

Identifying and validating neuroimaging biomarkers for OCD.

PIs: Drs. Odile van den Heuvel (Univ. of Amsterdam), Helen Blair Simpson (Columbia Univ.), Paul M. Thompson (USC) | Lab Role: Site-PI (Dr. Zhu)

Grant Number: NIH R01 DK137899

Project period: 2024-2029

This project investigates how prenatal exposure to maternal diabetes, with or without maternal obesity, influences early brain development and increases the risk of obesity in offspring during the first 1000 days of life.

PI: Dr. Shan Luo (USC) | Lab Role: Site-PI (Dr. Zhu)

Grant Number: NIH R61/33 MH116089

Project period: 2023-2027

Developing and testing eye-tracking-based gaze-contingent music reward therapy (GC-MRT) for SAD.

PIs: Dr. Franklin Schneier (Columbia Univ.) | Lab Role: Co-Investigator (Dr. Zhu)

Grant Number: NIH R01 MH114141084

Project period: 2025-2030

By integrating neuroimaging, genetic, and environmental factors, the proposed CentileBrain platform will identify deviations from normative brain patterns across major psychiatric disorders, enabling improved biomarker discovery and lifespan brain health research.

PI: Dr. Paul M. Thompson (USC) | Lab Role: Site-PI (Dr. Zhu)

Grant Number: NIH R21 AG093534

Project period: 2026-2028

This project aims to develop a novel group independent component analysis (ICA) algorithm, incorporating time-frequency information (GtfICA) to capture the temporal dynamics of functional networks (dFN) in longitudinal studies.

PIs: Dr. Seonjoo Lee (Columbia Univ.) | Lab Role: Site-PI (Dr. Zhu)

Grant Number: Israeli Ministry of Defense (MAFAT)

Project period: 2026-2027

This study will investigate sex-specific brain connectivity patterns and their interactions with trauma timing and type to identify candidate biomarkers that may inform individualized PTSD treatments.

PI: Dr. Yuval Neria (Columbia Univ.) | Lab Role: Co-I (Dr. Zhu)