King’s College London Professor Gemma Modinos Elected to Academia Europaea

The Academy is a European association for leading experts in science, education and research. Membership is awarded to individuals that have demonstrated ‘sustained academic excellence’, invited by existing members only and judged during a peer review selection process.

Gemma Modinos is Professor of Neuroscience & Mental Health in the Department of Psychological Medicine at the IoPPN. She is also a Group Leader at the MRC Centre for Neurodevelopmental Disorders, and EDI Lead of the Psychosis & Mood Disorders Theme at the NIHR Maudsley Biomedical Research Centre.

The research in her lab investigates the brain mechanisms involved in vulnerability for psychosis, with a strong focus on GABA and glutamate neurotransmission, and whether targeting these mechanisms may unlock the identification of new therapeutic strategies.

Gemma’s lab pioneered the use of multimodal neuroimaging approaches across humans and relevant animal models to understand brain vulnerability for psychosis. They have developed innovative approaches to link functional neuroimaging markers in psychosis to underlying cellular and molecular mechanisms, and use experimental medicine to probe these mechanisms with new pharmacological strategies. Gemma was also founder and is currently chair of the largest global consortium for neuroimaging research in schizotypy – ENIGMA Schizotypy.

Gemma is heavily involved in European science advice and policy, having served as 2020-2022 Chair of the Young Academy of Europe. She was was involved in writing the founding statutes for the Young Academies for Scientific Advice Structure (YASAS), by which young academies are now formally part of the science advice mechanism to the European Commission (SAPEA+). She was part of the European Commission’s Core Group who wrote the ‘Agreement on Research Assessment Reform’, launched in 2022. She is also member of the Academia Europaea’s Higher Education, Research and Culture in European Societies (HERCulES) expert group, and newly elected member of the Executive Board of the Schizophrenia International Research Society.

I am deeply honoured to have been elected as Member of Academia Europaea. This wonderful recognition is a tribute to the many brilliant students, lab members, colleagues and mentors I have been fortunate to work with over the years. Aside from promoting the advancement of scientific excellence, Academia Europaea’s mission involves fostering collaboration between European scholars and scientists, advise governments and international organisations in scientific matters. Our role in society can be larger than we do in our specific labs and institutions, and I very much look forward to contributing to the academy in this way.

Professor Gemma Modinos, King’s IoPPN

Founded in 1988, Academia Europaea is an academy of humanities; law; the economic, social, and political sciences; mathematics; medicine; and all branches of natural and technological sciences around the world. It focuses on research for public benefit and for the advancement of the education of the public of all ages.

The aim of the Academy is to promote European research, advise governments and international organisations in scientific matters, and further encourage interdisciplinary and international research. It’s over 6000 members are eminent, individual scientists and scholars who cover the full range of academic disciplines.

IoPPN experts who are also members of Academia Europaea include:

• Professor Terrie E. Moffit, Professor of Social Development
• Professor Francesca Happé, Professor of Cognitive Neuroscience
• Professor Sir Robin Murray, Professor of Psychiatric Research
• Professor Kate Tchanturia, Professor of Psychology in Eating Disorders
• Professor Christopher Shaw, Professor of Neurology and Neurogenetics
• Professor Peter Goadsby, Director of NIHR Clinical Research Facility & Professor of Neurology
• Professor Edmund Sonuga-Barke, Prof of Developmental Psychology Psychiatry & Neuroscience and Deputy Lead of the Child Mental Health and Neurodevelopmental Disorders Theme at the NIHR Maudsley Biomedical Research Centre
• Professor Andrew Pickles, Professor of Biostatistics and Psychological Methods