Frank Tarazi

Frank Tarazi, MBBS, PhD, MBA is an associate professor of Psychiatry at Harvard Medical School, and director of the Laboratory in Pharmacoeconomics and Health Outcomes at McLean Hospital. He is a preclinical and clinical expert on Alzheimer’s disease, Parkinson’s disease, schizophrenia, depression, and ADHD. Dr. Tarazi has published over 120 original articles and reviews in highly cited scientific and medical journals. He has also published over 12 book chapters, including a chapter in the standard textbook “Goodman and Gilman’s The Pharmacological Basis of Therapeutics,” and co-edited a book entitled “Neurological and Psychiatric Disorders: From Bench to Bedside.” Dr. Tarazi is the associate editor of Pharmacology and Therapeutics and CNS Spectrums and serves on the editorial board of several other journals.

Dr. Tarazi is a fellow of the American College of Neuropsychopharmacology (ACNP), and a member of the American Psychiatric Association and the American Academy of Neurology. He also a member of the World Economic Forum’s Global Council on Neurotechnologies and Brain Research.

Dr. Tarazi’s Laboratory in Pharmacoeconomics and Health Outcomes has a longstanding interest in understanding the pathology and neurobiology of neuropsychiatric disorders. The program focuses on clarifying the mechanisms of brain plasticity, gene expression, and responses of cellular elements to different psychotropic drugs, and has identified several novel brain sites and pathways that constitute attractive targets for new drug development.

Dr. Tarazi and his group have also established several animal models that provide close presentations of the core symptoms of neuropsychiatric conditions, and have efficiently utilized these models for assessing the actions of standard and experimental medications. He has been awarded research funding from NIH, NARSAD, the Stanley Foundation, and from several pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies.

The mission of the program is to continue discovering additional translational principles that provide new insights into the neurobiology of neuropsychiatric disorders, as well as developing much-needed novel drugs that are effective in managing these diseases, with superior safety, tolerability, and long-term maintenance.

He has extensive experience in the design and execution of clinical trials on psychotropic drugs, and has participated in the pre-clinical and clinical development of several antipsychotic and antidepressant drugs including aripiprazole (Abilify®), brexpiprazole (Rexulti®), iloperidone (Fanapt®), asenapine (Saphris®), vilazodone (Viibryd®), atomoxetine (Strattera®), and cariprazine (Vraylar®).

Dr. Tarazi is an expert on the economics of psychotropic drugs and on the mechanisms of action of antidepressant and antipsychotic drugs as well as how the neuropharmacology of psychotropic drugs can translate into therapeutic advantages including efficacy, safety, and tolerability.

He has received several awards including the A.E. Bennett Award from the Society of Biological Psychiatry, the Rafaelsen Fellowship Award from the Collegium Internationale NeuroPsychopharmacologicum, the Jordi Folch Pi Memorial Award from the American Society for Neurochemistry, the Alfred Pope Award from McLean Hospital, and the Dean’s Dissertation Award from Rutgers University.