UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. - Katie Burkhouse, associate professor of psychology, and Yogasudha Veturi, assistant professor of biobehavioral health and statistics, were recently named as recipients of the Dr. Frances Keesler Graham Early Career Professorship by the Social Science Research Institute at Penn State.
Burkhouse was awarded the professorship to continue her work in early brain and behavioral markers of depression and anxiety in youth.
“I’m deeply honored to receive the Dr. Frances Keesler Graham Early Career Professorship,” Burkhouse said. “My research program seeks to identify early brain and behavioral markers of depression and anxiety in youth and to translate these insights into innovative, evidence-based prevention programs. Through this professorship, I will examine how early life adversity, such as growing up with limited social and economic resources, shapes children’s brain development and emotional health.”
Burkhouse hopes that this support will allow her team to test how a positive emotion-focused prevention program for mothers and children can strengthen emotional well-being and reduce risk for anxiety and depression. Ultimately, through this work she aims to advance more effective, neuroscience-informed prevention strategies for families who need them most.
Veturi’s professorship will continue her work in improving the early detection of Alzheimer’s disease.
“The Dr. Frances Keesler Graham Professorship allows me to focus on a central challenge in Alzheimer’s research of early prediction. We do this when there is still time to make a meaningful difference via medical/lifestyle interventions, while also considering the genetic predisposition to the disease,” Veturi said.
Veturi hopes that her work using multi-modal data driven approaches will help bridge fundamental research and clinical practice and contribute to a future where late age neurodegenerative diseases can be detected earlier and managed more effectively. She noted that the professorship will provide independence and responsibility to shape a research agenda with lasting impact.
Burkhouse received her PhD in clinical psychology from Binghamton University (SUNY) in 2016 before completing an internship and NIMH T-32 Postdoctoral Fellowship at the University of Illinois at Chicago’s department of psychiatry. Her research program broadly focuses on identifying behavioral-brain risk phenotypes and preventive interventions for youth depressive disorders.
Veturi received her PhD in biostatistics from the University of Alabama at Birmingham in 2016 and then completed postdoctoral fellowships at the University of Pennsylvania’s Perelman School of Medicine and Geisinger’s Richie Lab. Veturi’s research includes integration of high-dimensional data with electronic health records to dissect shared genetics among complex human traits/diseases and to understand sex and ethnic differences in cognitive decline.
The Dr. Frances Keesler Graham Early Career Professorship provides supplemental funding to faculty members working in developmental neuroscience. The award rotates every three years to a new recipient in the first 10 years of her or his academic career, providing seed money for innovative research projects.
The professorship was created by Graham’s daughter, Mary Graham, to honor her late mother, who began her career in social and behavioral sciences as a Penn State undergraduate. More information on the professorship award, including the application process, can be found at SSRI’s professorship website.