History

The Stanley Center for Psychiatric Research at Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard was launched in 2007 with support from a $100 million commitment from the philanthropists Ted and Vada Stanley, through the Stanley Medical Research Institute. Together, our researchers and collaborators have harnessed and advanced DNA mapping and sequencing technologies, and have assembled the world’s largest collection of DNA samples in psychiatric research — including samples for schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, autism, ADHD, and healthy control samples. Analysis of these samples has linked hundreds of genomic regions to associated psychiatric disorders, and researchers have begun to identify specific gene mutations and the critical biological processes underlying psychiatric diseases — part of an ongoing mission to discover the biology of psychiatric disorders and lay the groundwork for effective therapies.

In July 2014, the Broad Institute announced that Ted Stanley increased his commitment to the Broad with an additional $650 million to the center. The commitment — the largest ever made for psychiatric research — was made to support researchers affiliated with the center and was aimed at “enhancing scientific research on psychiatric disorders with the hopes of leading to a breakthrough in new treatments.”