Professor Nicole C. Rust

Nicole C. Rust is an author, professor and scientist at the University of Pennsylvania. Her research focuses on understanding our remarkable ability to remember the things we’ve seen (“memory”) and what drives the mysterious feeling we call “mood”. As a complement to this foundational research, she works to develop new therapies to treat memory and mood disorders. Rust is the recipient of numerous awards, including the Troland Award from the National Academy of Sciences. She serves as a contributing editor at The Transmitter, a leading brain research news magazine. Rust is the author of the book Elusive Cures: Why Neuroscience Hasn’t Solved Brain Disorders — and How We Can Change That. In it, she argues that treating a brain disorder is more like redirecting a hurricane than fixing a domino chain of cause and effect, and that only once we embrace the idea of the brain as a complex system will we have any hope of improving treatments and cures for brain and mental illness.