{{short description|American medical academic}} {{Use mdy dates|date=July 2024}} {{third-party|date=May 2014}} {{Infobox person | birth_name = Ronald Stanton Duman | birth_date = {{Birth date|1954|02|06}} | birth_place = Ebensburg, Pennsylvania, U.S. | death_date = {{Death date and age|2020|02|01|1954|02|06}} | death_place = Guilford, Connecticut, U.S. | alma_mater = College of William & Mary<br>University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston | occupation = Neuroscientist }} '''Ronald Stanton Duman''' (February 6, 1954 – February 1, 2020)<ref>{{cite news|url=https://obituaries.tribdem.com/obituary/ronald-duman-phd-1078378084|title=Ronald Stanton Duman, PhD (Obituary)|newspaper=The Tribune-Democrat|date=February 6, 2020|accessdate=February 8, 2020}}</ref> was an American Professor of Psychiatry and Pharmacology Director, Division of Molecular Psychiatry and Abraham Ribicoff Research Facilities at Yale University.<ref>[http://www.med.yale.edu/psych/faculty/duman.html Duman's Yale Faculty Website] {{webarchive |url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090603033204/http://med.yale.edu/psych/faculty/duman.html |date=3 June 2009 }}</ref>

==Education== Duman graduated from the College of William & Mary (where he played varsity football as a middle linebacker) in 1976. He received his Ph.D. from the University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston (UTHealth) in 1985.

==Career== Ron Duman's research centered around the biological mechanisms behind antidepressants. In his landmark 1995 paper, he discovered that antidepressants increase the gene expression of Brain-Derived Neurotrophic Factor, or (BDNF)<ref>{{Cite journal |url=https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?db=pubmed&cmd=Retrieve&dopt=AbstractPlus&list_uids=7472505&query_hl=2&itool=pubmed_DocSum |title=First paper demonstrating the link between antidepressants and BDNF levels |year=1976 |pmid=2505 |access-date=11 September 2017 |archive-date=22 June 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220622120918/http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?db=pubmed&cmd=Retrieve&dopt=AbstractPlus&list_uids=7472505&query_hl=2&itool=pubmed_DocSum |url-status=dead |last1=Pramanick |first1=D. |last2=Forstová |first2=J. |last3=Pivec |first3=L. |journal=FEBS Letters |volume=62 |issue=1 |pages=81–84 |doi=10.1016/0014-5793(76)80021-x |s2cid=20044419 }}</ref> in the hippocampus. In a later paper he discovered that the downstream effect of BDNF is to increase neurogenesis or the formation of new neurons in the dentate gyrus of the hippocampus.<ref>{{cite journal | pmid=11124987 | date=2000 | last1=Malberg | first1=J. E. | last2=Eisch | first2=A. J. | last3=Nestler | first3=E. J. | last4=Duman | first4=R. S. | title=Chronic antidepressant treatment increases neurogenesis in adult rat hippocampus | journal=The Journal of Neuroscience | volume=20 | issue=24 | pages=9104–9110 | doi=10.1523/JNEUROSCI.20-24-09104.2000 | pmc=6773038 }}</ref>

The results of this work led him to formulate the hypothesis that depression is caused by a decrease in hippocampal neurogenesis caused by elevated cortisol levels.

==Death== Ronald Duman died on February 1, 2020, at the age of 65 while hiking in Guilford, Connecticut.<ref>[https://medicine.yale.edu/news-article/22519/ Ronald S. Duman, PhD, Pioneering Neuroscientist of Stress, Depression, and Antidepressant Treatment Dies at 65]</ref>

==Notes== <references />

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{{DEFAULTSORT:Duman, Ronald}} Category:1954 births Category:2020 deaths Category:American neuroscientists Category:American psychiatrists Category:People from Ebensburg, Pennsylvania Category:Scientists from Pennsylvania Category:University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston alumni Category:William & Mary Tribe football players Category:Yale School of Medicine faculty Category:Members of the National Academy of Medicine

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