Ramaris E. German, PhD Dr. Ramaris E. German is an associate clinical psychologist in the Section on Neuroscience and Novel Therapeutics. She has a broad range of clinical, research, and training experience working with children, families, and adults through her work at the University of Pennsylvania, American University, NYU-Bellevue Hospital Center, Washington DC VA Medical Center, Greenbelt Cares, and Neuropsychological Associates of Fairfax. Her research has focused on mechanisms in mood disorders, psychotherapy process, and outcome research, as well as in the dissemination and implementation of evidence-based practices. Before joining NIMH, Dr. German worked training community mental health therapists in evidence-based practices, including cognitive behavioral therapy, to increase access to quality mental health services through a partnership between the Philadelphia Department of Behavioral Health and the University of Pennsylvania (the Beck Community Initiative). I In her work in the Neuroscience and Novel Therapeutics Unit, Dr. German draws on her background in mood disorders, psychotherapy, and implementation research to help develop and evaluate novel psychotherapeutic treatments targeting the underlying brain mechanisms implicated in severe irritability in youth, with the goal of establishing empirically supported interventions for this population.

Jamell White, PhD, LCSW-C, LICSW Dr. Jamell White is a staff clinician for the Neuroscience and Novel Therapeutics Unit (NNT) in the Emotion and Development Branch at the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH). Dr. White received her Ph.D. from the University of Maryland in Human Development and Quantitative Methodology. She also has master’s degrees in social work (Catholic University of America) and special education (Johns Hopkins University). Dr. White is a Clinical Assistant Professor of Psychiatry (Child and Adolescent) at Georgetown University School of Medicine as well as a Clinical Assistant Professor in the Department of Pediatrics at the George Washington University School of Medicine and Health Sciences. Prior to coming to the NIMH, much of Dr. White’s clinical work specialized in working with children, adolescents, and adults with Autism Spectrum Disorder and related disorders.

Wendy Sharp, LCSW-C is a staff clinician for the Neuroscience and Novel Therapeutics Unit (NNT) in the Emotion and Development Branch at the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH). Ms. Sharp received her master’s degree in social work from Howard University and her bachelor’s degree from the University of Michigan. Prior to coming to the Emotion and Development Branch, Ms. Sharp worked at NIH on Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder research examining genetic and environmental factors that influence the development of brain and behavior. One study explored novel treatments, delivered in virtual reality, that were tailored to each child’s unique profile of cognitive strengths and challenges.

Simone Haller, PhD Dr. Simone Haller is the Director of Research and Analytics in the Neuroscience and Novel Therapeutics Unit (NNT). She completed her DPhil at the University of Oxford in Experimental Psychology with a focus on adolescent development and individual differences. At NNT, Dr. Haller studies the cognitive, computational, and neural processes that children and adolescents engage to regulate negative affect and select actions, such as approaching or avoiding a peer provocation. Her research focuses on understanding how these processes (e.g., social threat processing) are shaped by development and individual differences in anxiety and irritability, and how they can be targeted in interventions for youth with clinically significant levels of anxiety and irritability. In September 2020, she received a two-year NARSAD Young Investigator Grant from the Brain and Behavior Research Foundation for her project "Predicting longitudinal psychiatric effects of the COVID-19 pandemic in a transdiagnostic sample of youth using rest and task-based fMRI."

Marine Bouyssi-Kobar, PhD is a Staff Scientist in the Section on Neuroscience and Novel Therapeutics (NNT) at the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH). She completed her master's degree in Biomedical Engineering at Polytech Marseille (France) and her Ph.D. in Neurosciences at George Washington University.

Dr. Bouyssi-Kobar brings more than 15 years of experience in pediatric neuroimaging and clinical research, working fluidly across disciplines — from direct work with research participants and clinical teams to close collaboration with MRI physicists and neuroimaging engineers. Proficient with both 3T and ultra-high field 7T scanners, she has conducted hundreds of MRI scans on children and adolescents, while taking ownership of key analytical, regulatory, and mentorship responsibilities across complex research programs.

Her research investigates how neurobiological, genomic, and environmental factors shape brain development in youth with neurodevelopmental and psychiatric disorders, including ADHD. Her expertise spans multimodal MRI techniques — resting-state fMRI, diffusion tensor imaging, and Magnetic Resonance Spectroscopy (MRS) — across the full arc of neurodevelopment, from fetal and neonatal stages through childhood and adolescence.

In her current role at the NNT, Dr. Bouyssi-Kobar is focused on advancing the section's neuroimaging capabilities in support of novel brain-based markers for youth with psychopathology, with a particular interest in identifying multimodal imaging markers that predict treatment response. She is also deeply committed to mentorship, supporting junior researchers in neuroimaging methods, scientific communication, and career development.

Kyunghun Lee, PhD Kyunghun Lee is a computational scientist and software engineer in the Section on Neuroscience and Novel Therapeutics (NNT) at the National Institute of Mental Health. He earned his PhD from the University of Maryland, College Park, focusing on machine learning, embedded system optimization, and automated detection and classification. At NNT, he develops computational methods, research software, and automated workflows for neuroscience research, including algorithms that process real-time data from wearable devices. Since 2023, Dr. Lee has also served as a Visiting Professor in Biocomputational Engineering at the University of Maryland, College Park, where he teaches Algorithms and Object-Oriented Programming in C++.

Zoë E. Laky, MA Zoë is a clinical psychology Ph.D. student at American University, advised by Dr. Nicole Caporino, participating in the Graduate Partnership Program as a predoctoral IRTA fellow with the Neuroscience and Novel Therapeutics Unit at the NIMH. She completed her undergraduate degree in Psychology at Bryn Mawr College, a minor in Child & Family Studies, and a post-baccalaureate research position with the Center for OCD and Related Disorders (CORD) at Harvard Medical School (HMS)/Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH), directed by Dr. Sabine Wilhelm. She is particularly interested in leveraging multi-method assessment and machine learning to disentangle developmental risk factors and mechanisms of youth internalizing and externalizing disorders. Clinically, she treats youth with anxiety, trauma- and stress-related problems, and obsessive-compulsive disorder using a combination of cognitive and behavioral techniques.

Lauren Henry, PhD Dr. Lauren Henry is a post-doctoral IRTA fellow with the Section on Neuroscience and Novel Therapeutics (NNT) in the Emotion and Development Branch at the National Institute of Mental Health. She received her MS in psychology and PhD in clinical psychology with a minor in quantitative sciences from Vanderbilt University. She completed her pre-doctoral clinical psychology internship with the Charleston Consortium. Dr. Henry is interested in contributing to the prevention of psychopathology in children and adolescents. Her research focuses on leveraging technology to (1) investigate mechanisms of risk for psychopathology and (2) develop, evaluate, and implement preventive interventions for psychopathology for large-scale dissemination to improve public health. At the NNT, Dr. Henry is applying her interests to a population of clinically impaired youth with irritability.

Rachel Puralewski, PhD Rachel Puralewski is a post-doctoral -IRTA fellow with the Neuroscience and Novel Therapeutics Section. She received her B.S. from the University of Pittsburgh (Pitt) in 2015 with majors in Neuroscience & English Literature and a minor in Chemistry. After graduating, she spent two years working as a research assistant at Pitt with Dr. Marianne Seney. She completed her Ph.D. in Neuroscience at the University of Wisconsin-Madison in 2023 under the mentorship of Dr. Ned Kalin. Her dissertation work described the early-life development of prefrontal and limbic brain function as it relates to the emergence of Anxious Temperament in rhesus monkeys. Dr. Puralewski’s research interests are improving characterization of 1) psychopathology-related behaviors and 2) neural circuits underlying the psychiatric disorders that emerge in childhood. She leverages functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging (fMRI) to investigate brain function during behavioral tasks, and neural circuit organization at rest. With the NNT, Dr. Puralewski is investigating how neural circuitry in childhood differs between healthy youth and those with extreme anxiety, irritability, and other psychopathology.

‌Nicholas Santopetro, PhD Nick is a post-doctoral IRTA fellow with the Section on Neuroscience and Novel Therapeutics (NNT). Nick graduated in summer 2026 from Florida State University with a PhD in Clinical Psychology and completed his doctoral internship training at the Kennedy Krieger Institute and Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. His research seeks to examine whether reliable behavioral and neural measures can be leveraged to distinguish different phenotypes of psychopathology, with an emphasis on teasing apart neural markers unique to comorbid internalizing (e.g., depression, anxiety, DMDD) and externalizing (e.g., ADHD, ODD) disorders in youth populations. In particular, Nick wants to understand whether these behavioral and neural indices can be utilized to assist with predicting onset of mental health disorders and responsiveness to treatment.

‌Shannon Grogans, PhD Shannon is a post-doctoral fellow with the Section on Neuroscience and Novel Therapeutics. She received her B.A. from Northwestern University in 2016 with majors in Cognitive Science (neuroscience concentration) & Psychology. After graduating, she spent three years working as an IRTA research fellow at NIMH with Dr. Karen Berman. She completed her Ph.D. in Clinical Psychology at the University of Maryland in 2026 under the mentorship of Dr. Alex Shackman. She completed her pre-doctoral clinical psychology internship with the Ohio State University Wexner Medical Center. Her dissertation work centered on understanding the relevance of threat-related neural circuitry to the emergence and recurrence of internalizing symptoms and disorders in emerging adults, with a particular focus on the extended amygdala. Broadly, Dr. Grogans’s research interests are to to look across the lifespan to understand (1) the neurobiological substrates of neuroticism/negative emotionality (N/NE) and other risk-conferring emotional traits, and the relevance of threat- and safety-related brain circuits to (2) real-world mood and (3) future internalizing symptoms and disorders. Her work integrates multiple techniques, including fMRI, clinical/life-stress assessments, smartphone ecological momentary assessment (EMA), and advanced statistical approaches in at-risk and clinical populations. With NNT, Dr. Grogans is investigating how differences in brain structure/function among healthy youth and those with anxiety and mood disorders relate to momentary emotional experience, symptom trajectories, and treatment outcomes.