Three Students Awarded Karen L. Wrenn Alzheimer’s Disease Travel Prize

Grant recipients.

Two medical students and one doctoral student to attend scientific conferences

Two graduate medical students and one doctoral student in cognitive neuroscience have received 2019-2020 Karen L. Wrenn Trust Travel Awards. The awards, given each year to Duke Institute for Brain Sciences (DIBS) graduate students, are made possible through the generosity of the Wrenn Trust, named for Duke alumna Karen L. Wrenn, who died of Alzheimer’s Disease. Along with the Trust, the awards are supported by visionary Duke Alumni leader Marjorie Thomas.

Award recipients used the funding to attend and present research at key scientific conferences such as the annual Society for Neuroscience event, one of the foremost neuroscience events of the year. It allows them to benefit from presentations, exhibit posters, and network with other professionals.

This year’s awardees:

  • Tracy Darbeloff, doctoral student in the Cognitive Neuroscience program, who is identifying mid-life risk factors for Alzheimer’s disease. She is working in the laboratory of Dr. Hamad Hariri.
  • Deborah Oyeyemi, graduate medical student, who is studying the shared risks between dementia and post-operative cognitive decline. She is working in the laboratories of Drs. Heather Whitson and Miles Berger.
  • Cason B. Robbins, graduate medical student, who is working on the Duke Neurodegeneration Retinal Imaging Repository. He is working in the laboratories of Drs. Sharon Fedrat and Dilraj Grewal.

Originally posted on the DIBS website

Duke Researchers Receive NIH Funding to Combat Opioid Crisis

Pills.

Research teams from Duke received more than $24 million in federal grants to address challenges related to pain and the opioid crisis, with more than $19 million awarded to investigators from the Duke Clinical Research Institute (DCRI), the world’s largest academic research organization.

The grants are part of the NIH’s Helping to End Addiction Long-term Initiative (NIH HEAL Initiative). The federal research initiative, launched in early 2018 by NIH Director Francis S. Collins, aims to apply scientific solutions to improve treatments for chronic pain, curb the rates of opioid use disorder and overdose, and achieve long-term recovery for opioid addiction.

The Duke research awards are part of the NIH’s funding allocation that includes 375 grants across 41 states. Additional awards of more than $12 million are anticipated over the next 5 years, which would bring Duke’s total grant amount to more than $36 million.

“Duke researchers continue to be at the forefront of tackling some of the biggest issues that impact health and wellness in our world today,” said Mary E. Klotman, M.D., dean of the Duke University School of Medicine. “This support from the NIH will allow our faculty to explore new ways of managing chronic pain and overcoming addiction — efforts that could improve the lives of millions of people.”

Duke awards provide support for:

  • A clinical center to conduct Phase 2 trials of non-addictive pain interventions. The clinical center, called the Duke Pain Early-Phase Clinical Research Center, will be led by Alexander T. Limkakeng Jr., M.D., vice chief of research for the Duke Division of Emergency Medicine, and Francis Keefe, Ph.D., professor in the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences. The grant is for $1 million over 5 years.
  • A research project to identify new central analgesic circuits that could be harnessed to treat chronic pain. This effort is aimed at helping address chronic pain, a health problem that affects one-third of people in the U.S. Funded at $3.2 million over 5 years, the research is led by principal investigator Fan Wang, Ph.D., the Morris N. Broad Distinguished Professor of Neurobiology.
  • A research program to improve the efficacy of using an implantable medical device that stimulates the spinal cord to treat chronic neuropathic pain. Currently, fewer than two-thirds of people who receive this therapy experience at least a 50 percent reduction in pain, creating a need for new patterns of spinal cord stimulation that provide better pain suppression. The project is led by Warren Grill, Ph.D., professor of biomedical engineering in Duke’s Pratt School of Engineering. It is funded at $1.1 million over 3 years.

Grill is a member of the Duke Institute for Brain Sciences (DIBS) Faculty Steering Committee. Wang is a former member of the DIBS Faculty Governance Committee. Limkakeng was involved in a Bass Connections in Brain & Society project team led by DIBS on stemming the opioid epidemic.

Five additional awards were granted to members of the Duke Clinical Research Institute. Read the full article on the Duke Health website.

Noted Autism Researcher Named Director of Duke Institute for Brain Sciences

Dawson.

Geri Dawson, a leading researcher of autism spectrum disorders, has been named director of the Duke Institute for Brain Sciences (DIBS), Provost Sally Kornbluth and School of Medicine Dean Mary Klotman announced this week.

“We are immensely pleased that Geri—an internationally renowned scientist and clinician who has a long track record of inspiring and effective institutional leadership, and who now has deep knowledge of the DIBS community and mission—has agreed to serve in that role,” Klotman and Kornbluth said in a message to DIBS faculty and staff.

Three associate directors will serve as part of the DIBS leadership team: Nicole Schramm-Sapyta, Alison Adcock, and Leonard White.

The William Cleland Professor of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences in the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, Dawson will also continue to lead the Duke Center on Autism and Brain Development.

For the past two years, DIBS has been led by a faculty governance committee – chaired by Dawson – in conjunction with Schramm-Sapyta, who served as chief operating officer.

Klotman and Kornbluth praised those who have led the unit for the past two years in this untraditional leadership structure and recognized the work that they had done in setting strategic priorities and engaging the wider Duke neuroscience community.

“Together, you each played a part in stewarding DIBS through a complicated period,” they said.

Dawson will assume the directorship on July 1. A licensed practicing clinical psychologist and scientist, she is past president of the International Society for Autism Research. She serves as a member of the NIH Interagency Autism Coordinating Committee, which develops the federal strategic plan for autism research, services, and policy.

Dawson joined the Duke faculty in 2014 having already established a significant research record on the early detection and treatment of autism and brain development. At Duke, she has established numerous connections outside her home department. She also has appointments in pediatrics, psychology and neuroscience, the Sanford School’s Center for Child and Family Policy, and the Duke Global Health Institute.

She has participated in interdisciplinary academic programs such as Bass Connections, where she and Guillermo Sapiro led the development of an early autism screening app based on computer vision analysis, which is currently being validated in Duke Primary Care. Dawson co-led with Scott Kollins a successful effort to establish Duke as an NIH Autism Center of Excellence, based on an NIH P50 award that is focused on early detection, brain function, and treatment of autism and ADHD. With Joanne Kurtzberg, Dawson is conducting clinical trials funded by the Marcus Foundation to evaluate cellular therapies for autism.

Dawson’s extensive experience in leading and catalyzing interdisciplinary collaborations will serve her and Duke well as DIBS director, Klotman and Kornbluth said. “We are confident that the wider neuroscience community will continue to thrive in this next phase for DIBS.”

Originally posted on Duke Today

Duke Institute for Brain Sciences Awards Three-Year Wrenn Fellowship to Will Huffman

Will Huffman.

The Duke Institute for Brain Sciences is pleased to announce that Will Huffman, a graduate student in Biomedical Engineering in the Pratt School of Engineering, has received the Wrenn Graduate Fellowship in Alzheimer’s Disease. Huffman is a student in the laboratory of Dr. Warren Grill, Professor of Biomedical Engineering. His research project will involve a collaboration between the Grill lab and the lab of Niccolo Terrando, Department of Anesthesiology, in the School of Medicine.

The award will allow Huffman to perform research in the area of Alzheimer’s disease diagnosis, treatment, and pathophysiology for three years while pursuing his doctoral degree. “Will is a creative and accomplished biomedical engineer who will thrive in an interdisciplinary career advancing research in Alzheimer’s Disease,” said Dr. Grill.

As a Wrenn Fellow, Huffman plans to develop strategies to prevent cognitive decline following surgery, a condition for which Alzheimer’s patients are particularly at risk, and which can accelerate the progression of the disease. The strategy will involve stimulating the vagus nerve and thereby reducing inflammation in the brain. A strength of this approach is that it is non-invasive and ultrasound-based.

The Wrenn fellowship, awarded every three years in the amount of $40,000, is made possible through the generosity of the Wrenn Trust, named for Duke alumna Karen L. Wrenn, who died of Alzheimer’s Disease. This is the second three-year Wrenn Fellowship awarded; the inaugural Wrenn Fellowship was awarded to Yixin Ma, PhD, in 2017. Ma is a postdoctoral associate in Duke’s Medical Physics Graduate Program.

Will received his bachelor’s degree in Biomedical Engineering from the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, and his Master’s degree in Biomedical Engineering from Duke in 2016.

Originally published on the Duke Institute for Brain Sciences website

Duke Institute for Brain Sciences Seeks Proposals for 2019-20 Research Awards

DIBS Research Awards.

Deadline: May 1, 2019 for Letters of Intent

The Duke Institute for Brain Sciences (DIBS) is pleased to announce the call for proposals for the 2019-2020 Research Incubator and Research Germinator Awards. These awards provide seed funding to support interdisciplinary, innovative brain science research within Duke.

By supporting such research, DIBS hopes to encourage innovative approaches to problems that transcend the boundaries of traditional disciplines, integrating the brain sciences with the social sciences, physical sciences, gene sciences, humanities, law, business, public policy, mathematics, computer science, and engineering.

We aim to support the exploratory phase of research that is likely to lead to external funding if successful. See more information about the Research Awards program, including the 2019-2020 schedule and full application forms.

Applications Now Open for Two DIBS Funding Mechanisms

Incubator Awards

Novel collaborations among at least two faculty from different departments at Duke, for one year, up to $100,000. See 2018-2019 Incubator Award recipients and projects.

Germinator Awards

Interdisciplinary projects or training experiences relevant to the brain sciences. Open to faculty, graduate students, postdoctoral fellows, and residents, for one year, up to $25,000. See the inaugural Germinator Award recipients and projects.

To Apply

Investigators interested in submitting proposals for either funding mechanism should submit a Letter of Intent by May 1, 5:00 p.m. ET, via the webform links:

  • Incubator Award Letter of Intent Webform
  • Germinator Award Letter of Intent Webform

Letters of Intent should include:

  • Proposal title
  • Brief description of work
  • Names and departmental affiliations of all collaborators (at least two collaborators required for Incubator applications; Germinator applications may be submitted by single individuals)
  • For Incubator Letters of Intent only: Brief description of the novelty of the collaboration. If any subsets of the group have worked together before, describe how this is truly a novel collaboration.

See more information on the DIBS website.

Faculty to Pursue Collaborations through 2019 Intellectual Community Planning Grants

ICPG 2019.

A key goal of Together Duke is to invest in faculty as scholars and leaders of the university’s intellectual communities. To foster collaboration around new and emerging areas of interest, Intellectual Community Planning Grants (ICPG) are available to groups of faculty.

These grants cover the cost of food, meeting venues, external speakers or other meeting costs, and exploratory research into potential collaborators at Duke and elsewhere. The offices of the Vice Provost for Interdisciplinary Studies and the Executive Vice Provost oversee this seed grant program.

For the 2019 calendar year, eight groups received Intellectual Community Planning Grants ranging from $1,000 to $5,000.

Big Data and Social Interactions

Big Data and Social Interactions faculty members.

This group will facilitate interactions among faculty who want to learn how technological advancements and big data can improve our understanding of the ways in which social norms and interactions affect individuals’ and firms’ behavior. The primary goal is to produce sustained interactions and research papers capable of being published in leading scholarly journals. A kick-off event will include a visiting speaker. Subsequent meetings will invite faculty to provide overviews of recent research and discuss new ideas; review colleagues’ early-stage research ideas; and share early work with a guest speaker who is a pioneer in the field.

  • Lead: Jillian Grennan, Fuqua School of Business
  • Chris Bail, Trinity College of Arts & Sciences, Sanford School of Public Policy
  • Ines Black, Fuqua School of Business, Duke Innovation & Entrepreneurship Initiative
  • Ofer Eldar, Law School, Duke Innovation & Entrepreneurship Initiative
  • Sarah Gaither, Trinity College of Arts & Sciences
  • Sharique Hasan, Fuqua School of Business, Duke Innovation & Entrepreneurship Initiative
  • Rachel Kranton, Trinity College of Arts & Sciences
  • David Robinson, Fuqua School of Business, Duke Innovation & Entrepreneurship Initiative

Building Duke’s Community of Theoretical Chemists via a Summer Undergraduate Research Program

Building Duke’s Community of Theoretical Chemists via a Summer Undergraduate Research Program faculty members.

An emerging community of theoretical chemists at Duke is spread across schools and departments. This group has begun to organize a Summer Undergraduate Research Program in Theoretical Chemistry, which will help strengthen the pool of graduate student applicants from North America. The Intellectual Community Planning Grant will enable the participation of more faculty (those who could not fully fund a student on their own) and support team-building excursions. All faculty will present multiple seminars and mentor the summer undergraduate researchers.

  • Lead: David Beratan, Trinity College of Arts & Sciences, School of Medicine, Duke University Energy Initiative
  • Hashim Al-Hashimi, School of Medicine
  • Volker Blum, Pratt School of Engineering, Trinity College of Arts & Sciences, Duke University Energy Initiative
  • Patrick Charbonneau, Trinity College of Arts & Sciences
  • Stephen Craig, Trinity College of Arts & Sciences, Duke University Energy Initiative
  • Bruce Randall Donald, Trinity College of Arts & Sciences, School of Medicine, Pratt School of Engineering, Duke Institute for Brain Sciences, Duke Center for Genomic and Computational Biology
  • Jianfeng Lu, Trinity College of Arts & Sciences
  • Michael Rubinstein, Pratt School of Engineering, Trinity College of Arts & Sciences
  • Warren S. Warren, Trinity College of Arts & Sciences, School of Medicine
  • Weitao Yang, Trinity College of Arts & Sciences, Duke University Energy Initiative

Exploring STEAM (Science, Arts, and Humanities) at Duke

Exploring STEAM at Duke members.

A working group of Duke faculty, staff, administrators, and students will explore overlapping and complementary interests in science, technology, engineering, mathematics, arts, and humanities (broadly referred to as STEAM), and promote more robust interdisciplinary research, coursework, and public engagement in this space, both within and beyond Duke. The group will organize a half-day forum to catalog and describe innovative STEAM activities occurring at Duke and spark new collaborations among faculty, students, staff, and administrators.

  • Lead: Misha Angrist, Social Science Research Institute, Duke Initiative for Science & Society, Sanford School of Public Policy
  • Co-lead: Jory Weintraub, Duke Initiative for Science & Society
  • Project manager: Ariana Eily, Duke Initiative for Science & Society
  • Nicolette Cagle, Nicholas School of the Environment
  • Aria Chernik, Social Science Research Institute, Duke Innovation & Entrepreneurship Initiative
  • Claudia Gunsch, Pratt School of Engineering, Nicholas School of the Environment, Duke University Energy Initiative
  • Jules Odendahl-James, Trinity College of Arts & Sciences
  • Nimmi Ramanujam, Pratt School of Engineering, School of Medicine, Duke Global Health Institute, Duke Initiative for Science & Society, Duke Innovation & Entrepreneurship Initiative
  • Nina Sherwood, Trinity College of Arts & Sciences, School of Medicine, Duke Institute for Brain Sciences, Duke Initiative for Science & Society
  • Kearsley Stewart, Duke Global Health Institute, Duke Initiative for Science & Society
  • Victoria Szabo, Trinity College of Arts & Sciences, Duke Innovation & Entrepreneurship Initiative

Health as an Ecosystem: Expanding Our Imaginations of Health

Health as an Ecosystem faculty members.

In ecology, an ecosystem is a community of living organisms and their interactions with the abiotic environment. Dynamic and complex, they may flourish in settings of balance, diversity, and responsive resilience, or they may flounder in contexts of deficit and disruption. This group will apply the ecosystem concept to health and explore new perspectives on health systems, population health, well-being, and disease. During monthly meetings, members will consider a range of questions and engage in activities whose focus will encompass capstone projects, seminars, and future grant proposals.

  • Lead: John Moses, School of Medicine, Duke Initiative for Science & Society
  • Co-lead: Jennifer Lawson, School of Medicine, Duke Initiative for Science & Society
  • Charles Nunn, Trinity College of Arts & Sciences
  • Richard Di Giulio, Nicholas School of the Environment, Pratt School of Engineering
  • Alice Ammerman, University of North Carolina – Chapel Hill
  • Eliana Perrin, School of Medicine
  • Eric Richardson, Pratt School of Engineering
  • Jan Holton, Divinity School
  • Brett McCarty, Divinity School
  • Bill Walker, Pratt School of Engineering, Duke Innovation & Entrepreneurship Initiative
  • Peter English, Trinity College of Arts & Sciences
  • Gopal Sreenivasan, Trinity College of Arts & Sciences, School of Medicine, Duke Initiative for Science & Society
  • Norman Wirzba, Divinity School, Nicholas School of the Environment
  • Jon Fjeld, Fuqua School of Business, Duke Innovation & Entrepreneurship Initiative
  • Ray Barfield, School of Medicine, Divinity School, School of Nursing, Duke Initiative for Science & Society
  • Warren Kinghorn, School of Medicine, Divinity School, Duke Initiative for Science & Society

Launching a Triangle-Wide Seminar in the Economics of Education

Launching a Triangle-Wide Seminar in the Economics of Education faculty members.

Currently, there is no regular forum for economists from the Triangle to discuss new empirical work on the economics of education. This group will change that by organizing a one-day workshop. Hosted by the Center for Child and Family Policy, the event will include invited presenters, discussants, and a keynote speaker. It will also serve as a means to explore the possibility of launching a year-long seminar series in 2019-2020 on the economics of education.

Marine Medicine: Multidisciplinary Research at the Nexus of the Environment and Human Health

Marine Medicine faculty members.

Marine medicine is focused on research that cuts across disciplines, including cross-species comparative analyses of cancer protective mechanisms, understanding the risk of disease from exposure to environmental toxins, and discovery of new drugs from marine compounds. This working group will convene monthly and invite guest speakers to provide critical feedback on papers and proposals. Members will also host an annual symposium with a keynote speaker and a networking event to establish collaborations between faculty across the School of Medicine and the Nicholas School of the Environment, and create a long-term strategy for sustained interactions.

Parasite-Host Evolution Network Optimization (PHENO) Working Group

Parasite-Host Evolution Network Optimization (PHENO) Working Group faculty members.

Better methods are needed to identify new pathogens or known animal pathogens with the potential to infect humans and cause disease. Given that pathogens transmit through chains of contact, network-based approaches that represent these epidemiological pathways offer great promise. Through regular meetings, this group of faculty and postdocs will investigate the application of network approaches to a wide range of disease systems and aim to develop new and fundable research projects.

  • Lead: James Moody, Trinity College of Arts & Sciences, Social Science Research Institute
  • Charles Nunn, Trinity College of Arts & Sciences
  • Craig Rawlings, Trinity College of Arts & Sciences
  • Gregory Gray, School of Medicine, Duke Global Health Institute
  • Chris Woods, School of Medicine, Duke Global Health Institute
  • Meira Epplein, School of Medicine
  • James Herrera, Trinity College of Arts & Sciences
  • Dana Pasquale, Duke Network Analysis Center

Social Studies of Science Working Group

Social Studies of Science Working Group faculty members.

The social study of science, often referred to as science and technology studies, is an interdisciplinary field whose scholars explore topics ranging from the ethical implications of data hacking and the politics of nuclear power to questions of personhood emerging from neuroscience. This group will bring together faculty who are interested in the rapid scale-up of research in the biomedical sciences, data and computational sciences, and environmental sciences as well as the increasing overlap of science and technology studies, medical humanities, and environmental humanities. Members aim to build a network of Duke and Triangle faculty and foster linked research endeavors.

  • Lead: Harris Solomon, Trinity College of Arts & Sciences, Duke Global Health Institute, Duke Initiative for Science & Society
  • Nicole Barnes, Trinity College of Arts & Sciences, Duke Global Health Institute
  • Nima Bassiri, Trinity College of Arts & Sciences
  • Paul Bendich, Trinity College of Arts & Sciences, Rhodes Information Initiative at Duke
  • Mark Olson, Trinity College of Arts & Sciences, Duke Initiative for Science & Society, Duke Innovation & Entrepreneurship Initiative
  • Cate Reilly, Trinity College of Arts & Sciences
  • Gabriel Rosenberg, Trinity College of Arts & Sciences
  • Priscilla Wald, Trinity College of Arts & Sciences, Duke Initiative for Science & Society
  • Ara Wilson, Trinity College of Arts & Sciences, Duke Initiative for Science & Society

Doctoral Students Can Apply for Fellowship in Alzheimer’s Research

Wrenn Fellowship.

Deadline: March 1, 2019

The Duke Institute for Brain Sciences invites Duke PhD students to apply for the Wrenn Fellowship in Alzheimer’s Disease. One three-year fellowship in the amount of $40,000 per year will be awarded.

About the Fellowship

The fellowship is made possible through the generosity of the Wrenn Trust, named for Duke alumna Karen L. Wrenn, who died of Alzheimer’s Disease. This will be the second three-year Wrenn Fellowship awarded; the inaugural Wrenn Fellowship was awarded to Yixin Ma, PhD, in 2017.

Requirements

Applicants must be matriculated Duke PhD students who have completed their graduate coursework and are actively working on an innovative research program focused on the diagnosis, pathophysiology, or therapeutics of Alzheimer’s Disease. The awardee will be named a Wrenn Fellow and will be asked to provide an annual research report and to attend periodic meetings with the donor to provide updates.

To Apply

To apply for the Wrenn Fellowship, please submit the following materials by Friday, March 1, 2019, at 5 p.m. ET, to Nicole Schramm-Sapyta, PhD, DIBS Chief Operating Officer, at nicole.schrammsapyta@duke.edu:

  • An updated curriculum vitae
  • Official Duke transcript
  • 1-2 page research summary
  • Letter of support from the student’s graduate mentor

Review and Selection

Applications will be reviewed by a panel composed of Duke graduate faculty in the brain sciences, as well as faculty from the Alzheimer’s research community within Duke. The new Wrenn Fellow will be announced this summer.

Questions

Questions about the award should be directed to Dr. Schramm-Sapyta, nicole.schrammsapyta@duke.edu.

Duke Honored for Durham Research Partnerships through Bass Connections and Data+ Programs

Laylon Williams, Nicole Schramm-Sapyta, Elijah Bazemore.

Nicole Schramm-Sapyta named Volunteer of the Year at Durham Crisis Intervention Team Awards Banquet; Data+ and Bass Connections in Brain & Society honored as Community Partner Agencies of the Year

Nicole Schramm-Sapyta of the Duke Institute for Brain Sciences researches addiction. In the summer of 2016, she began working with a Duke Bass Connections Brain & Society team to learn more about the opiate epidemic in Durham. In Bass Connections teams, students and faculty address real-world problems through research, creativity, and collaboration with external partners.

Interested in the local law-enforcement perspective on drug use, they met with members of the Durham Police Department’s Crisis Intervention Team (CIT). CIT members are police officers and other first responders who have received extensive special training to respond to citizens in crisis, often due to underlying behavioral health issues such as addiction or mental illness. More than 950 first responders in Durham have been CIT-trained since 2007.

“A third of people in our jails have mental health issues. It’s great to have Duke and the Duke Institute for Brain Sciences on board, because we need the research, we need our work to be evidence-based, because people’s lives are at stake.” –Wendy Jacobs, Durham County Board of Commissioners Chair

When Schramm-Sapyta and her students first met with the CIT officers, a one-hour meeting stretched to more than two hours of open, honest discussion. The students asked hard questions and the officers responded with experience, policy information, and honesty. The Bass Connections students were so impressed that they wanted to spread the word. They organized two CIT presentations on campus and three Mental Health First Aid training sessions, the latter completed by more than 100 members of the Duke community.

Schramm-Sapyta and students were encouraged to return and brainstorm with CIT members about ways Duke could support the program. They learned the CIT had lots of data on 9-1-1 calls but no one to analyze it and make it useful to CIT. Schramm-Sapyta connected with Paul Bendich, Associate Professor of Math and Data+ leader, and thus was born the first Data+/CIT project, “Mental Health Interventions by Durham Police.”

Data+, run by Duke’s Rhodes Information Initiative, is a 10-week summer research experience for undergraduates interested in exploring new data-driven approaches to complex challenges.

Schramm-Sapyta described the successful Data+/CIT collaboration on Dec. 7 during her keynote remarks at CIT’s 11th Annual Recognition Banquet, held at the Durham Human Services Complex. Data+ and Bass Connections in Brain & Society were named “Community Partner Agency of the Year,” and Schramm-Sapyta was honored as “Volunteer of the Year.”

CIT honorees.The annual event recognizes “Exemplary and Dedicated Work of Durham County’s CIT First Responders,” according to the program. Sponsors included National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI) Durham and Alliance Behavioral Healthcare. Teshéa Grant, Public Information Officer for Durham County Emergency Medical Services (EMS), served as Mistress of Ceremonies.

Team members from EMS, the Sheriff’s Department, DPD, Duke University and N.C. Central University Police departments, Durham Emergency Communications, and Durham Technical Community College also were honored.

Local officials attending included City of Durham Mayor Steve Schewel, Durham County Board of Commissioners Chair Wendy Jacobs, and current and former Durham County Sheriffs Clarence Birkhead and Mike Andrews. Len White, Associate Professor of Neurology and DIBS Associate Director for Education, attended as co-leader of the Bass Connections Brain & Society theme, which DIBS manages.

Officials made clear how important it is to understand the links between people with mental health issues, local law enforcement, and incarceration. “A third of people in our jails have mental health issues,” Jacobs said. “It’s great to have Duke and DIBS on board, because we need the research, we need our work to be evidence-based, because people’s lives are at stake.”

“This is a fantastic example of the potential for really deep, enduring partnerships between Duke and local institutions and law enforcement in Durham.” –Ed Balleisen, Vice Provost for Interdisciplinary Studies

Bendich told event attendees he loves to expose students to really hard problems and to professionals who are working on the problems. “Technical excellence is important but more important is whether you’re able to explain your solutions to people on the ‘pointy end’ of these hard problems,” he said. “To do so, you have to craft a story and make it believable, compelling. Projects like this one are beautiful examples.” On a personal note, he added, “I’m a child of two mental health professionals, so this project is especially meaningful to me.”

The Data+ team’s first project was to analyze 9-1-1 calls between 2011 and 2016 and determine if there were any patterns related to CIT-tagged calls—and indeed there were! Behavioral health-related calls typically peak on Wednesdays between 8 a.m. and noon, (“Hump Day is real,” said Schramm-Sapyta), but are sparse on Sunday mornings between 4 and 8 a.m.—information CIT could then use to deploy resources.

Students also looked at various areas of the city regarding the number of CIT calls. “Not surprisingly,” Schramm-Sapyta said, “the poorest areas of our city are the greatest utilizers of CIT services.” That’s good news in that it suggests citizens are familiar with CIT and its services, and the services are going where they are most needed, she pointed out. “It also suggests the need for greater mental health services in these areas, so that crises can be averted.”

In 2017, a second Data+ project looked at whether CIT was helping reduce recidivism, i.e., how often convicted criminals are returning to jail after they have been released. Those identified as having a behavioral health issue are much more likely to return to jail, Schramm-Sapyta noted. This time, data were provided by the Durham County Sheriff’s Office and the Durham County Jail.

“Before CIT existed, recidivism was on the rise in Durham,” Schramm-Sapyta said. “As CIT was first established, and the program began to grow, recidivism leveled off.” In the most recent five years, as CIT and Durham have grown rapidly, and other mental health services at the jail and in the community have increased, recidivism has dropped sharply, she noted.

Ed Balleisen, Duke’s Vice Provost for Interdisciplinary Studies, oversees DIBS and Bass Connections. He emphasized the special nature of the Data+ and Bass Connections projects linked to the Durham community.

“This is a fantastic example of the potential for really deep, enduring partnerships between Duke and local institutions and law enforcement in the city and county of Durham,” he said. “These projects allow pursuit of significant research questions that can inform decision-making and deploy the creativity of Duke’s faculty and students in partnership with local institutions to carry out that research and present it, with an eye toward allowing decision-makers to see their world more clearly and have a better sense of what’s working and what isn’t,” Balleisen added.

Schramm-Sapyta ended her Dec. 7 remarks by thanking the Bass Connections Brain & Society Theme and the Data+ program—and especially the CIT. “I’ve learned Durham is a great place to live, and CIT is a big part of that greatness.”

Originally posted on the Duke Institute for Brain Sciences website

Photos: Laylon Williams of the National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI) Durham, Nicole Schramm-Sapyta, Elijah Bazemore of the Durham County Sheriff’s Office Detention Services Division (courtesy of Williams); CIT honorees, including representatives Len White and Paul Bendich, standing at left, and Schramm-Sapyta, seated in center