Michael Lewis

Michael Lewis is a research scientist in the Psychiatric Disease Program at the Broad Institute. He focuses on the development of animal models of psychiatric disease, as well as the molecular effects of psychiatric medication. He hopes to bring this knowledge to bear on the next generation of anti-psychotic and mood-stabilizing drugs.

In 2011, Lewis and his fellow researchers in the Broad’s Stanley Center for Psychiatric Research published a paper describing an important signaling pathway modulated by lithium — a mood-stabilizing medication used primarily in the treatment of bipolar disorder. The researchers may be able to exploit the signaling pathway to identify a new class of mood-stabilizing drugs.

Lewis joined the Broad Institute in 2008 after completing a Ph.D. in behavioral neuroscience at Temple University, and conducting postdoctoral research in the same field at Yale University.