Brookhaven Lab’s Fritz Henn Awarded the Federal Cross of Merit From Germany
October 6, 2008
UPTON, NY — Fritz Henn, Associate Laboratory Director for Life Sciences at the U.S. Department of Energy’s Brookhaven National Laboratory, has been named a recipient of the Federal Cross of Merit, a high-level honor of the Federal Republic of Germany. The medal will be presented to him today in Mannheim Palace, Germany.
From 1994 to 2006, Henn was Director of the Central Institute of Mental Health in Mannheim, Germany, as well as professor of psychiatry at the University of Heidelberg, Germany. During this time, the Central Institute became internationally renowned in large part due to Henn’s leadership. Henn also initiated a new area of study at the institute — the neuroscience of addiction — and, for the first time in Germany, the study of addiction merited its own department in an academic institution.
“Being awarded this honor is a great surprise for me,” said Henn. “It represents the achievements of the entire faculty of the Central Institute of Mental Health in bringing it to its current level of recognition.”
Henn is an expert in the neuroscience of depression, an area of research that he has pursued for his entire career. Recently, he discovered a new neural circuit — a group of interconnected neurons, or nerve cells, that influence each other — that, if stimulated electrically, can ease depression. This new circuit has been identified in both animals and humans through the use of two medical imaging methods — magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) and positron emission tomography (PET). This research may lead to new, more effective treatments for depression.
Henn also recently found evidence that invalidates a current theory on depression. The theory states that a decrease in the generation of new nerve cells contributes to depression. New advances in brain imaging have allowed scientists to more accurately measure the creation of new nerve cells, which, contrary to earlier theories, are generated throughout life in humans. Henn’s new studies show that these nerve cells continue to be created at a normal rate in depressed individuals as well. Henn has continued his studies of depression with the aid of sophisticated imaging methods (MRI and PET) at Brookhaven Lab.
A board-certified psychiatrist, Henn earned a Ph.D. in physiological chemistry from The Johns Hopkins University in 1967, and an M.D. from the University of Virginia in 1971. He performed his residency in the Department of Psychiatry at Washington University School of Medicine from 1971 to 1974. Henn began his career at the University of Iowa College of Medicine, and, in 1982, he joined Stony Brook University (SBU), where he became Professor and Chair of the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Medicine. In addition, from 1982 to 1983, he was Director of the Long Island Research Institute, New York State Office of Mental Health, and, from 1983 to 1994, he was Director of SBU’s Instiute for Mental Health Research. He moved to Germany in 1994, to become the Director of the Central Institute of Mental Health and Professor of Psychiatry at the University of Heidelberg, positions he held until he assumed his current role at Brookhaven Lab in 2006.
2008-10843 | INT/EXT | Newsroom
