Nicholas D. Schiff BA, MD

Dr. Nicholas Schiff directs an integrative translational research program with a primary focus on understanding the process of recovery of consciousness following brain injuries. This research program links basic systems and clinical neuroscience with the goal of developing novel neurophysiologic and neuroimaging diagnostics applied to human subjects and therapeutic strategies. Dr. Schiff and his research group have contributed several landmark advances, including the first demonstrations of brain structural alterations occurring in the setting of very late recovery from severe brain injury.

More recently, Dr. Schiff and his colleagues have taken insights into the neurophysiological mechanisms of arousal regulation and of deep brain electrical stimulation techniques to demonstrate evidence that long-lasting, severe cognitive disability may be influenced by electrical stimulation of the human central thalamus. Dr. Schiff received the 2007 Research Award for Innovation in Neuroscience from the Society for Neuroscience for this research. This work provides an important foundation for developing further understanding of both the mechanisms of recovery of consciousness and basic mechanisms underlying consciousness in the human brain.