EMBARGOED FOR RELEASE:
Saturday, Dec. 7, 2019
8:45 a.m. EST
BALTIMORE - Helen E. Scharfman, Ph.D., received the Research Recognition Award for basic
science at the annual meeting of the American Epilepsy Society (AES), a medical and
scientific society whose members are dedicated to advancing research and education for
preventing, treating and curing epilepsy.
Dr. Scharfman is a professor of child and adolescent psychiatry, neuroscience and physiology,
and psychiatry at New York University (NYU) Langone Health and an investigator at the NYU
Neuroscience Institute. She is also a research scientist in the Center for Dementia Research at
The Nathan S. Kline Institute for Psychiatric Research, which is affiliated with NYU and the
New York State Office of Mental Health. Dr. Scharfman has a basic research laboratory
focused on mechanisms that regulate excitability and plasticity in the normal brain of rodents
and in animal models of epilepsy. She has published more than 150 articles and edited or coedited five books.
At AES, she has served on the board of directors and numerous committees such as the
publications, investigators workshop, program and basic sciences committees. She has also
been a contributing editor for Epilepsy Currents, AES’ open access commentary journal.
She has received National Institutes of Health (NIH) support since starting her laboratory in
1991 and has served on the boards for many national and international organizations, such as
the NIH, and provided ad hoc reviews for more than 40 peer-reviewed journals. She has
served on editorial boards of Science Translational Medicine, eLife, J. Neuroscience, Sci.
Reports, Epilepsia, Epilepsy Research, Epilepsy and Behavior, and Epilepsy Research and
Treatment.
Dr. Scharfman obtained her doctoral degree in pharmacology at the Uniformed Services
University of the Health Sciences and her postdoctoral training at the University of
Washington, Seattle. She then worked at the State University of New York, Stony Brook,
before she started her laboratory at Columbia University in New York.
AES’ Research Recognition Awards are given annually to active scientists and clinicians
working in all aspects of epilepsy research. The awards are designed to recognize professional
excellence reflected in a distinguished history of research of important promise for the
improved understanding and treatment of epilepsy. These awards include a $10,000
honorarium.