Two National Institutes of Health (NIH) inventors, Drs. Peter Basser and Carlos Zarate, Jr., have been selected as part of the 2024 National Academy of Inventors (NAI) Fellows. NAI Fellowship is the highest professional distinction awarded solely to inventors.

The National Academy of Inventors is a member organization comprising U.S. and international universities, and governmental and non-profit research institutes, with over 4,000 individual inventor members and Fellows spanning more than 250 institutions. The 2024 Fellows hail from 135 research universities, governmental and non-profit research institutions worldwide and their work spans across various disciplines. They are not only phenomenal researchers holding prestigious honors and distinctions but are also incredible inventors who collectively hold over 5,000 issued U.S. patents and whose innovations are making significant tangible societal and economic impacts today and will well into the future.

Dr. Peter Basser is a Senior Investigator in the Section on Quantitative Imaging and Tissue Sciences at the NIH Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD). Dr. Basser is widely known for the invention, development, and clinical implementation of MR diffusion tensor imaging (DTI), diffusion tensor "streamline tractography," and other quantitative MRI methods for performing in vivo MRI histology or "microstructure imaging". Dr. Basser’s work has transformed how neurological disorders and diseases are diagnosed and treated, and how brain architecture, organization, structure, and anatomical “connectivity” are studied and visualized. Dr. Basser was recently an NIH Distinguished Lecturer for the 15th Annual Philip S. Chen, Jr., Ph.D., Distinguished Lecture on Innovation and Technology Transfer hosted by the NIH. His talk was on using water migration to probe brain structure and architecture. If you are interested in working with Dr. Basser you can find the technologies he has available for licensing or collaboration on the NIH Technology Transfer website.

Dr. Carlos A. Zarate, Jr., is Chief, Section on the Neurobiology and Treatment of Mood Disorders and Chief of Experimental Therapeutics and Pathophysiology Branch (ETPB) at the NIH National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) and Clinical Professor of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences at The George Washington University. Dr. Zarate formed the Experimental Therapeutics and Pathophysiology Branch at the NIMH in 2009. Dr. Zarate has had a prolific career researching the treatment of mood and anxiety disorders, most recently licensing an invention that led to the development of the first FDA-approved drug for treatment-resistant depression (Spravato®). Dr. Zarate’s Branch conducts proof-of-concept studies utilizing novel compounds and biomarkers (magnetoencephalography [MEG] and polysomnography [PSG], positron emission tomography [PET], functional magnetic resonance imaging [fMRI] and magnetic resonance spectroscopy [MRS]) to identify potentially relevant drug targets and biosignatures of treatment response. He is a member of the National Academy of Medicine and was the NIH Distinguished Lecturer for the 16th Annual Philip S. Chen, Jr., Ph.D. Distinguished Lecture on Innovation and Technology Transfer hosted by the NIH. His talk was on developing novel medications for treatment resistant depression and bipolar disorder. If you are interested in working with Dr. Zarate, you can find the technologies he has available for licensing or collaboration on the NIH Technology Transfer website.