World-Renowned Neuroscientist Dr. Gül Dölen To Join UC Berkeley Faculty.
THE BOB AND RENEE PARSONS FOUNDATION TO GIFT $6 MILLION DOLLARS TO SUPPORT THE UNIVERSITY’S PSYCHEDELIC SCIENCE RESEARCH
Dr. Gül Dölen, a world-renowned neuroscientist leading the effort to understand the molecular mechanisms through which the brain engages with psychedelic substances, is joining the UC Berkeley faculty on January 1, 2024, thanks to a generous $6 million gift from The Bob & Renee Parsons Foundation.
The Parsons Foundation’s gift has allowed Berkeley to establish The Renee & U.S. Marine LCpl Bob Parsons Endowed Chair for a tenured professor working at the intersection of psychedelic science, psychology, and neuroscience.
Dölen, currently associate professor of neuroscience at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, will take up this newly created position in Berkeley’s Department of Psychology, with research ties to both the UC Berkeley Center for the Science of Psychedelics (BCSP), an interdisciplinary unit focused on psychedelic research and education, and the campus’s Helen Wills Neuroscience Institute.
“I am thrilled to be joining the faculty at UC Berkeley, whose myriad breakthroughs and reputation for research excellence I have long admired,” said Dölen. “And, of course, because it is the home of the Berkeley Center for the Science of Psychedelics, the birthplace of CRISPR, and a leader in the field of psychology, I am eager for the new collaborative opportunities this move will open up. I am very much looking forward to contributing to this vibrant community.”
“Professor Dölen has conducted transformative research that has led the field to think in new ways about sensitive periods and neural plasticity,” said Psychology Department Professor and Chair Ozlem Ayduk. “We are very excited to have her join our department, bringing her unique expertise. We have every expectation of her lab continuing to produce groundbreaking findings for years to come.”
This is the first gift to UC Berkeley from The Bob & Renee Parsons Foundation, which supports low-income and underserved populations, marginalized communities, and causes that are often overlooked by mainstream philanthropy. Their areas of giving comprise: youth and education; health and home; military and first responders; and the American dream.
Bob Parsons, founder of GoDaddy, PXG (Parsons Xtreme Golf), and other successful businesses, was motivated to make this gift after being inspired by How to Change Your Mind, the 2019 best-selling book by Michael Pollan, Berkeley professor emeritus of journalism and a BCSP co-founder. Pollan’s book helped popularize a renaissance in psychedelics research for therapeutic benefits. Parsons credits the book with making him aware of psychedelics, along with his wife Renee’s urging to get help, which have enabled him to overcome undiagnosed post-traumatic stress disorder from his service during the Vietnam War.
“As my PTSD raged on for decades, it affected not only me, but my entire family. Nearly 50 years after the Vietnam War, with the help of psychedelics, I finally came home,” said Bob Parsons, Co-founder of The Bob & Renee Parsons Foundation. “Millions of people—veterans and civilians alike—have suffered the effects of PTSD and other crippling conditions for far too long. With visionaries at UC Berkeley like Michael Pollan, and now Dr. Gül Dölen, we hope to continue to leverage the power of psychedelics and find true healing.”
“Bob and I are thrilled to help bring Dr. Gül Dölen, a remarkable pioneer in the field of neuroscience, to UC Berkeley’s Center for the Science of Psychedelics”, said Renee Parsons, Co-founder of The Bob & Renee Parsons Foundation. “Her passion to look beyond the current field of psychedelic research to explore what she terms the ‘next next thing’ is exhilarating. I have no doubt that Dr. Dölen will open new frontiers of thinking in psychedelics, and am delighted that UC Berkeley has chosen an exceptional female scientist for this important role.”
“Because of Gül Dölen’s groundbreaking work, we are beginning to understand how psychedelics work in the brain and why these substances have healing potential,” said Michael Pollan. “There is no better time or place to expand this research than at UC Berkeley. I know her innovative research will contribute significantly to this vital work.”
Dölen was drawn to the study of psychedelics as an undergraduate student at Duke University, where she designed her own major focused on comparative perspectives of the mind. She received joint M.D. and Ph.D. degrees from Brown University and MIT and conducted postdoctoral research at Stanford University.
Dölen’s studies in animal models, including mouse and octopus, suggest that psychedelics may operate in the brain by reopening “critical periods,” finite windows of opportunity that enable more rapid learning. Her work with the two-spot octopus demonstrated that doses of the psychedelic chemical MDMA caused this normally antisocial animal to display more prosocial, playful behavior. MDMA also activates a critical period for brain plasticity in mice. Research in Dölen’s lab has shown that other psychedelic substances, such as psilocybin and ketamine, can reopen a critical period for social reward learning.
A current research project of Dölen’s aims to test the hypothesis that psychedelic substances unlock multiple critical periods throughout the brain — a property that could yield therapeutic benefit for a range of neuropsychiatric diseases. Said Dölen, “The endowed chair will enable my lab to pursue riskier projects that are difficult to fund through traditional mechanisms, including our studies of octopuses and psychedelics.”