Professor Dr. Steven A. Kushner is Full Professor of Neurobiological Psychiatry at the Department of Psychiatry of Erasmus MC. He completed his undergraduate degree summa cum laude at the University of Pennsylvania, studied Medicine and Neuroscience through the National Institutes of Health – Medical Scientist Training Program at the University of California, Los Angeles and received clinical training as a psychiatrist at the New York State Psychiatric Institute and Columbia University, including board certification. His laboratory is focused on developing advanced human organ-on-chip models of neuropsychiatric diseases, using a combination of electrophysiology (patch-clamp, MEA), calcium imaging, stem cell engineering and brain organoid technology to uncover the pathophysiology of mental illness. He has received several honors and awards, including Journal Watch Psychiatry (NEJM Group) recognition for one of the 10 most influential papers in clinical Psychiatry (2012, 2015), the prestigious NWO Talent Scheme Vidi Award and Erasmus MC Desiderius Award. He is the coordinator of the Institute for human Organ and Disease Model Technologies (hDMT) brain-on-a-chip program, founding member of the ENCORE Center for Neurodevelopmental Disorders, co-Director of the Academic Center of Excellence for Population Neuroscience, executive committee member of the European Molecular and Cellular Cognition Society (EMCCS), and former Chair of the Dutch Neuroscience Meeting.(2016).