Olivier Berton, PhD, is a tenure-track assistant professor at the University of Pennsylvania Perelman School of Medicine with a primary appointment in the Department of Psychiatry and affiliations with the neuroscience and pharmacology graduate groups. One of Dr. Berton’s major interests is the role of chromatin-regulating enzymes in the effects of antidepressant and antiparkinsonian therapies.

Dr. Berton is a native of France. He completed his undergraduate and graduate studies at Bordeaux Segalen University and graduated with a PhD in neuroscience in 1998. After two years in the pharmaceutical industry conducting antidepressant drug discovery (UCB Pharma, Brussels, Belgium), Dr. Berton joined UT Southwestern Medical Center (Dallas, Texas), where he trained as a postdoctoral fellow with Eric J. Nestler until 2008.  Dr. Berton is the recipient of several competitive awards including Young Investigator Awards from INSERM (1999), FRM (2001) and NARSAD (2005, 2008) and a Rising Star Award from IMHRO (2010). Dr. Berton received a fast track grant from The Michael J. Fox Foundation in 2003 to study the role of the transcription factor ∆FosB in the development of levodopa-induced dyskinesia in non-human primates. Research in Dr. Berton’s lab is currently funded by RO1 MH087581 from the National Institute of Mental Health.