Constantine Stratakis, M.D.
Scientific Director, NICHDScientific Director
The intramural research program is led by Constantine Stratakis, M.D., Scientific Director, who also directs the Section on Endocrinology and Genetics within the Program on Developmental Endocrinology and Genetics.
Scientific Director's Annual Message
As scientific director, Dr. Stratakis oversees the research programs of 85 investigators and more than 400 trainees, organized around four thematic areas associated with human development:
- Biology of cell fate
- Biology of growth and development
- Biology of reproduction
- Biology of cognition and behavior
Within this framework are eleven programs: in cell biophysics and chemistry, cell regulation and metabolism, and cell metabolism and biology; genomics of differentiation, developmental endocrinology and genetics, developmental immunology; reproductive sciences and medicine, perinatology; and developmental neuroscience.
Chris McBain, PhD
Deputy Director, DIR, NICHDDeputy Director
Dr. McBain received his BSc from the University of Aberdeen, Scotland and Ph.D. from the University of Cambridge, England, where he worked with Ray Hill studying spontaneously arising epileptiform activity in the rat hippocampus. During a postdoctoral fellowship with Raymond Dingledine at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, he studied glutamate receptor function, regulation of the extracellular volume fraction and hippocampal synaptic transmission with particular relevance to the epilepsies. After a brief period in the laboratory of Julie Kauer at Duke University, Dr. McBain joined NICHD as an Investigator within the Laboratory of Cellular and Molecular Neurophysiology. He is currently a Senior Investigator and Program Chief of the Developmental Neurobiology Program.
His laboratory is studying mechanisms of cortical synaptic transmission and the role of voltage-gated channels in the regulation of excitability within hippocampal circuits.
