Inaugural lecture: Shadows and Light

Professors Ian Kelleher, Daniel Smith, and Heather Whalley discuss their careers exploring the treatment of mental health conditions such as depression, bipolar disorder and psychosis.

Professor Ian Kelleher is Chair of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry at the University of Edinburgh and a Consultant Child and Adolescent Psychiatrist working in specialist CAMHS. His research interests are in the prediction and prevention of serious mental illness. He leads an interdisciplinary research team that takes a data-driven approach to identifying individuals at risk of psychosis and bipolar disorder, as well as research on psychotic and attenuated psychotic symptoms in clinical and non-clinical populations.

Professor Daniel Smith has been conducting research on bipolar disorder (also known as 'manic depression') for over 20 years. His current focus is the investigation of how disrupted circadian rhythms - such as daily rhythms of sleep and activity - impact on the clinical course of bipolar disorder. This work combines a range of different experimental approaches and ultimately aims to develop novel 'chronotherapy' treatments for bipolar disorder.

Professor Heather Whalley is Professor of Neuroscience and Mental Health and Chief Scientist for Generation Scotland. Her work focusses on adolescent mental health and population-based scalable research, including linking biological and healthcare data using AI approaches. Her research in particular seeks to understand the adolescent period of development, considering it a critical period of opportunity to positively influence lifelong mental health trajectories.

Recorded 18 September 2024, Chancellor's Building, BioQuarter campus.