Dr. Ryan Rampersaud is a Ryan is an Assistant Professor in the Division of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry in the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences at the University of California, San Francisco. He is a physician-scientist with extensive research experience spanning multiple disciplines and is deeply committed to furthering our understanding of the biology of psychiatric diseases to improve the lives of individuals suffering from these illnesses.

Dr. Rampersaud completed his medical degree and PhD in Microbiology/Immunology at Columbia University. There his work focused on the vaginal microbiome and the pathogenesis of Bacterial Vaginosis (BV) and BV-associated pre-term labor, specifically examining the role of Lactobacillus species in the vaginal ecosystem. He completed postdoctoral training at the UCSF Institute for Neurodegenerative Disease studying the role of prions (infectious protein particles) in Parkinson’s Disease and Multiple System Atrophy. He completed clinical training in adult psychiatry and child/adolescent psychiatry at UCSF and subsequently completed additional research training in the neurobiology of mood disorders (including depression and post-traumatic stress disorder) with a specific focus on identification of peripheral biomarkers of psychiatric illness in human populations. His current NIH funded program of research aims to leverage this diverse background to elucidate the mechanisms by which host-associated microbiomes contribute to the development and maintenance of psychiatric diseases with the goal of developing novel microbial directed therapies for the treatment of these devastating illnesses.