About Dr. Heather Berlin, PhD

Dr. Heather Berlin is a neuroscientist, clinical psychologist and Associate Clinical Professor of Psychiatry and Neuroscience at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai. She is also a Visiting Scholar at the New York Psychoanalytic Society and Institute and practices clinical neuropsychology at New York Presbyterian Hospital/Weill Cornell Medical College in the Department of Neurological Surgery. She explores the neural basis of impulsive and compulsive psychiatric and neurological disorders with aim of developing novel treatments. She is also interested in the brain basis of consciousness, dynamic unconscious processes, and creativity.

Dr. Heather Berlin is the recipient of numerous honors including the Young Investigator Award from the American Neuropsychiatric Association, the International Neuropsychological Society Phillip M. Rennick Award, the Young Investigator Award from the National Education Alliance for Borderline Personality Disorder, and the Clifford Yorke Prize from the International Neuropsychoanalysis Society. She was honored as one of Stony Brook University’s “40 Under Forty”, and won the 2015 BBC University Challenge as part of the Magdalen College, Oxford team. She has published over 40 peer-reviewed articles and chapters including in high-impact journals like American Journal of Psychiatry and Brain.

Passionate about science communication and promoting women in STEM, Berlin is a committee member of the National Academy of Sciences’ Science and Entertainment Exchange, and The New York Times TimesTalks. She hosted the PBS series Science Goes to the Movies, and the Discovery Channel series Superhuman Showdown, and co-wrote and stars in the critically acclaimed off-Broadway and Edinburgh Fringe Festival show, Off the Top, about the neuroscience of improvisation. Berlin has made numerous media appearances including on the BBC, History Channel, Netflix, StarTalk, National Geographic, and TEDx, and was featured in the documentary fill Bill Nye: Science Guy. She received her Ph.D. from the University of Oxford and Master of Public Health from Harvard University.