From left to right: 2006 Lyme Team: Iordan Slavov, PhD, Brian Fallon, MD, Kathy Corbera, MD, Samantha Luk, BA.

Brian A. Fallon, MD, MPH, Associate Professor of Clinical Psychiatry at the Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons, is the director of the Lyme Disease Research Program at the New York State Psychiatric Institute. A graduate of Harvard College, he obtained his M.D. degree from the Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons, as well as a master's degree in public health epidemiology from Columbia University. He did his research training and an NIH fellowship in biologicial psychiatry at Columbia Presbyterian Medical Center and the New York State Psychiatric Institute.  In addition to his work on anxiety, obsessive compulsive disorder, and somatoform disorders, Dr. Fallon has published and lectured widely on the neuropsychiatric effects of Lyme Disease. Currently, Dr. Fallon is the principal investigator of a 4 year NIH-Funded study of Brain Imaging and Treatment of Persistent Lyme Encephalopathy.

Ronald Van Heertum, MD is Professor and Vice-Chair of Radiology, Chief of Nuclear Medicine, and Director of the Columbia Presbyterian Medical Center PET Center. Recognized widely as an expert in the clinical application of functional imaging technology to health care, Dr. Van Heertum and his nuclear medicine team have conducted brain SPECT and PET scans on over 1,000 patients with a history of Lyme Disease. .

Robert De La Paz, MD, Professor of Radiology and Director of Neuroradiology at the Columbia Presbyterian Medical Center, has been a leader in the development and application of Magnetic Resonance Imaging. He has substantial research experience in basic and human studies combining MRI and PET assessments of structural and functional abnormalities.

Dr. Harold Sackeim, PhD is Professor of Psychiatry and Radiology at Columbia University and Chief of Biological Psychiatry at the New York State Psychiatric Institute. Dr. Sackeim is an international authority on the conduct and analysis of brain imaging studies, having conducted pioneering studies since 1982 of cerebral blood flow and metabolism in such disorders as depression, cerebrovascular disease, Alzheimer's disease, and Lyme disease.

Jay Dobkin, MD, Associate Professor of Clinical Medicine [Infectious Disease] at Columbia University, is Chairman of the Lyme Research Study Safety Committee and Director of the AIDS Research Program at the Columbia Presbyterian Medical Center.

Carolyn Britton, MD, Associate Clinical Professor of Neurology at Columbia University, is the chief neurologist for our Lyme studies.  She has extensive experience in Lyme Disease, M.S., HIV, and neurovirology.

Ted Dwyer, MD, is Chief Rheumatologist for our Lyme studies and has published on the role of HLA markers in Lyme arthritis.

Kathy Miller Corbera, MD, coordinator of the NIH study of Persistent Lyme Encephalopathy, has a broad expertise in clinical infectious disease research both in Argentina where she worked on an AIDS unit at the Hospital de Infecciosas Francisco J. Muniz and in the United States where she worked as a research fellow in the Department of Neurology at the Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center.

John Keilp, PhD is an Associate Research Scientist in the Division of Neuroscience at Columbia University. He has extensive experience in the assessment of cognitive impairment in psychiatric (depression) and neurologic (dementia, HIV and Lyme encephalopathy) disorders. He has also conducted numerous studies examining correlations between cognitive deficits and brain blood flow.