Pat Levitt, Ph.D.
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Professor of Pharmacology
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Annette Schaffer Eskind Chair and Director, Kennedy Center for Research on Human Development, Vanderbilt University
Pat Levitt, Ph.D., is Annette Schaffer Eskind Chair and Director of Vanderbilt University's Kennedy Center for Research on Human Development.. He received his Ph.D. degree in neuroscience at the University of California in San Diego. He completed a postdoctoral fellowship in neuroscience at Yale University School of Medicine in New Haven, CT.
Named a McKnight Foundation Scholar in 2002, Dr. Levitt is an elected Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science and the Chairman of the Scientific Advisory Board of Cure Autism Now. He is a member of the Dana Alliance for Brain Initiatives, the National Scientific Council on the Developing Child, the Scientific Advisory Board of the National Center for Toxicological Research, and the MacArthur Foundation Network on Brain Development and Development of Behavior. His research interests are in the development of brain circuits that control learning and social-emotional functions. His genetics and basic research studies focus on understanding the basis of neurodevelopmental and neuropsychiatric disorders, and how genes and the environment together influence typical and atypical development.
Dr. Levitt serves on the editorial board of Biological Psychiatry, Cerebral Cortex, Neuron, and is a Senior Editor for the Journal of Neuroscience. He is the author or co-author of over 150 scientific papers.
