The SFI Early Career Researcher Award went to Dr Claire Gillan of TCD and FI at the ADAPT Centre. Dr Gillan is an internationally renowned expert on mental illness. She was the first to show that patients with obsessive-compulsive disorder have tendencies to form habits – a discovery that features in several undergraduate textbooks today.
Dr Gillan runs a lab that focuses on using data science to understand, predict and treat mental health conditions. Her lab has funding from various sources, including an ERC starting grant, Science Foundation Ireland Frontiers Award and a fellowship from MQ transforming mental health. Industry partners include SilverCloud Health, a leading provider of internet-based cognitive behavioural therapy (iCBT).
She is also Director of Research at The Neureka Project which is developing technology-based approaches to scaling-up psychiatry research, including developing a smartphone app developed with support from the ADAPT centre. Neureka has more than 10,000 registered citizen science users all contributing to our understanding of how the brain works.
