Federal Grant Award Summary

The National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) awarded The Trustees of Columbia University in the City of New York a $1.54M Project Grant under the Mental Health Research Grants program (CFDA 93.242) for research on decoded functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) neurofeedback as a treatment for auditory verbal hallucinations (AVH) in schizophrenia. The award, obligated on June 15, 2026, with a completion date of March 31, 2028, supports development of a novel, well-tolerated therapeutic approach that enables patients to modify brain activation patterns in real time through implicit learning based on feedback. This research addresses a critical clinical gap, as approximately one-third of patients with schizophrenia do not respond adequately to antipsychotic medications and frequently discontinue treatment due to severe side effects.

The research delivers a personalized neuromodulation intervention that targets granular activation patterns within speech-selective auditory cortex regions associated with AVH symptoms. Unlike conventional neuromodulation approaches that have achieved limited success by targeting coarse regional activation levels, decoded neurofeedback uniquely provides subject-specific targeting of fine-grained within-region activation patterns. The study builds on prior functional neuroimaging research that identified distinct activation patterns distinguishing AVH from non-AVH silent events and speech-evoked responses, positioning this work to advance psychiatric treatment through precision neuroscience methodologies.