Joel E. Kleinman, M.D., Ph.D. is the Chief of the Section on Neuropathology and
the Deputy Chief of the Clinical Brain Disorders Branch. Dr. Kleinman received his
B.S., M.D. and Ph.D. from the University of Chicago. He completed an internship
at San Francisco General Hospital (University of California Medical School in
San Francisco) and residencies in psychiatry and neurology at Massachusetts
Mental Health Center (Harvard Medical School) and George Washington University
Medical School, respectively. He has been at the NIMH from 1976 to the present
and has published over 200 papers primarily on the neuropathology of schizophrenia.
Research Interests
The Section on Neuropathology has a large collection of human brains of
normals and patients with psychiatric disorders including schizophrenia,
affective disorders and substance abuseThe research program of the Section
on Neuropathology is primarily interested in the neuropathology of schizophrenia.
The Section seeks to determine the molecular, cellular and genetic mechanisms that
underlie this syndrome. This has led us to focus on neural circuits involving
prefrontal cortex, mesial temporal lobe, brainstem and striatum with special
influence on molecules involved in synapse formation, plasticity and neurodevelopment.
Susceptibility genes for schizophrenia and their relationships to neural circuits
and the aforementioned types of molecules are a major focus of this Section.
Representative Publications
Weickert CS., Webster M.J., Colvin S.M., Herman M.M., Hyde T.M., Weinberger D.R. and Kleinman J.E:
Localization of epidermal growth factor receptors and putative neuroblasts in human subependymal zone.
J. Comp. Neurol. 423: 359-372, 2000.
Weickert CS., Webster M.J., Hyde T.M., Herman M.M., Bachus S.E., Bali G., Weinberger D.R. and Kleinman J.E.:
Reduced GAP-43 mRNA in dorsolateral prefrontal cortex of patients with schizophrenia.
Cerebral Cortex 11: 136-147, 2001
Webster MJ, Weickert CS, Herman MM, Hyde TM and Kleinman JE:
Synaptophysin and GAP- 43 mRNA levels in the hippocampus of subjects with schizophrenia.
Schizophrenia Research 49:89-98, 2001.
Romanczyk TB, Weickert CS, Webster MJ, Herman MM, Akil M and Kleinman JE:
Alterations in trkB mRNA in the human prefrontal cortex across the life span.
European J. of Neuroscience 15: 269-280, 2002.
Crook JM, Akil M, Law BCW, Hyde TM and Kleinman JE:
Comparative analysis of group II metabotropic glutamate receptor
immunoreactivity in Brodmann's area 46 of the
dorsolateral prefrontal cortex from patients with schizophrenia and normal subjects.
Molecular Psychiatry 7:157-164, 2002
