Diego A. Pizzagalli

Diego A. Pizzagalli is a Swiss neuroscientist, the Founding Director of the Noel Drury, M.D. Institute for Translational Depression Discoveries, a Distinguished Professor in the Department of Psychiatry and Human Behavior & Department of Neurobiology and Behavior and the Noel Drury MD Endowed Chair at the University of California, Irvine. He is also a Visiting Professor at the University of Oxford.

Pizzagalli is known for his contributions to the neurobiology of anhedonia and depression. His research has focused on investigating the causes, consequences, and pathophysiology of depression, with particular emphasis on identifying neurobiological mechanisms and biomarkers associated with the disorder and treatment response..

Education Pizzagalli received his M.S. in Psychology in 1995 and Ph.D. in Psychology in 1998 from the University of Zurich, Switzerland. He then pursued a postdoctoral fellowship in affective neuroscience with Richard J. Davidson at the University of Wisconsin, Madison, where he used neuroimaging approaches (e.g., electroencephalogram, positron emission tomography) to identify neural markers associated with different symptom profiles and treatment response in major depression.

Career From 2002 to 2010, Pizzagalli was a faculty member in the Department of Psychology at Harvard University, where he served as the John and Ruth Hazel Associate Professor of the Social Sciences. In 2010, Pizzagalli joined McLean Hospital, Massachusetts to serve as the Founding Director of the Center for Depression, Anxiety and Stress Research (CDASR). At McLean Hospital, Pizzagalli was also the Director of the McLean Imaging Center (MIC), the Director of Research for the Division of Depression & Anxiety Disorders, the Director of the McLean Conte Center for the Neurobiology of Approach-Avoidance Decision Making, and the Director of the Laboratory for Affective and Translational Neuroscience.

In addition, he served as a Professor of Psychiatry at Harvard Medical School and held the position of Director of a Silvio O. Conte Center for Basic Translational Mental Health Research.

He served as Scientific Advisor on the US National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) In 2021, he was named the Editor-in-Chief of Cognitive, Affective & Behavioral Neuroscience (CABN). He joined Anxiety and Depression Association of America (ADAA) in 2013 and joined the Board in 2024.

In January 2025, Pizzagalli joined the University of California, Irvine, serving as the Founding Director of the Noel Drury, M.D. Institute for Translational Depression Discoveries. Spanning the School of Medicine, School of Biological Sciences, and the School of Engineering, the Institute will lead the way in bench-to-bedside research, focusing on improved treatment and prevention strategies.

Research Pizzagalli's research is focused on three critical endophenotypes associated with depression: anhedonia, increased stress sensitivity, and executive function deficits.

Investigating Neurobiology of Anhedonia

Pizzagalli developed a laboratory-based measure of anhedonia – the Probabilistic Reward Task (PRT) – which has been used by hundreds of labs worldwide in both academia and the pharmaceutical industry. More recently, he has co-developed versions of the PRT that are functionally identical for use in humans, non-human primates, rats and mice. This development accelerates cross-species translation and evaluation of novel treatment targets.

Investigating Functional Neuroanatomy of Depression

Utilizing a combination of neuroimaging methods, Pizzagalli's research indicates that distinct brain activation patterns correlate with individual variances in treatment response and specific depression phenotypes. These findings hold significance in the identification of individuals at increased risk for depression and the advancement of more effective depression treatments.

Investigating Executive Dysfunction in Depression and At-Risk Individuals

Pizzagalli's research reveals the association between the behavioral impairments in depression and an exaggerated, automatic neural response to errors, along with limited recruitment of brain regions responsible for cognitive control. His ongoing studies aim to evaluate the hypothesis that these dysfunctions might increase vulnerability to subsequent depressive episodes.

Establishing Predictors of Treatment Response in Depression

Pizzagalli's research demonstrates that pretreatment resting EEG activity in the rostral anterior cingulate cortex predicted therapeutic improvement 4–6 months later in individuals with depression.

Awards and honors Christensen Fellowships, St Catherine's College, Oxford University, 2024 Visiting Professor, Oxford University, 2023 Board Member, Anxiety and Depression Association of America, 2024 MERIT awards, the National Institute of Mental Health, 2016, 2022 Editor-In-Chief, Cognitive, Affective and Behavioral Neuroscience, since 2021 Highly Cited Researcher, Web of Science, since 2019 NARSAD Distinguished Investigator Award, Brain & Behavior Research Foundation, 2017 Scientific Advisor, American Foundation for Suicide Prevention, 2017 Joel Elkes Research Award, American College of Neuropsychopharmacology (ACNP), 2017 Stuart T. Hauser, M.D. PhD. Mentorship Award in Psychiatry, Harvard Medical School, 2017 Anne M. Cataldo Excellence in Mentoring Award, McLean Hospital, 2015 Early Career Award, the EEG and Clinical Neuroscience Society, 2007 Distinguished Scientific Award for an Early Career Contribution to Psychophysiology, the Society for Psychophysiological Research, 2006

Personal life Pizzagalli was born and raised in Mendrisio, Switzerland. He is married to a clinical psychologist and has two adult children.