Chad Sylvester
Associate Professor of Psychiatry (Child)
- Phone: 314-286-1700
- Email: chad.sylvester@nospam.wustl.edu
Additional Titles & Roles
- Director, Pediatric Anxiety Disorders Clinic
- Associate Professor of Radiology
Education & Training
- Fellowship: Washington University, St. Louis, MO, 2014
- Residency: Washington University, St. Louis, MO, 2012
- M.D.: Washington University in St Louis, 2009
- Ph.D.: Washington University in St Louis, 2009
- B.S.: University of Notre Dame, 2001
Major Awards
- AACAP Robinson Cunningham Award, For best manuscript written by a child and adolescent psychiatrist during residency training, American Acad. of Child & Adolescent Psychiatry, 2013
- Eli Robins Award, For excellence in clinical psychiatry, teaching, and research and in recognition of potential for leadership in academic medicine, Washington University School of Medicine, 2013
- Alpha Omega Alpha Honor Medical Society, Washington University School of Medicine, 2012
- Peter Halstead Hudgens Award, For excellence in research and clinical psychiatry, Washington University School of Medicine, 2009
- Spencer T. and Ann W. Olin Fellow, For past achievement and the promise of a distinguished career in the biomedical sciences, Washington University School of Medicine, 2009
Areas of Clinical Interest
Chad Sylvester, MD, PhD is a Child and Adolescent psychiatrist, and a Castle Connolly Top Doctors® physician. He specializes in Pediatric Anxiety Disorders and directs this specialty clinic at Washington University.
Research Interests
My program of research focuses broadly on the development of functional brain networks in children with and without psychiatric disorders; and uses this information to develop and test novel treatments. I have led research that relates brain function (using fMRI) to psychiatric symptoms or psychiatric risk in newborn infants, young children, adolescents, and adults. Over the last couple of decades, I have led several studies that use fMRI and behavioral methods in children with and without anxiety disorders and other psychiatric illnesses. This work includes task-based fMRI of neonates in which variation in response to salient sound stimuli is related to risk trajectories for childhood anxiety disorders; and fMRI studies of executive function- and attention-related brain systems in children versus without anxiety disorders. We also used precision functional neuroimaging (PFM) to precisely characterize brain development during infancy as well as windows of high neuroplasticity. More recently, we have measured brain activity in children and adolescents as they watch movies, enabling rich characterization of brain responses to complex socio-emotional stimuli. Additional work involves testing novel computer-based cognitive training programs to retrain brain systems altered in pediatric anxiety disorders and reduce symptoms of anxiety.
Recent Publications
-
Youth Generalized Anxiety and Brain Activation States During Socioemotional Processing
Camacho, M. C., Schwarzlose, R. F., Perino, M. T., Labonte, A. K., Koirala, S., Barch, D. M. & Sylvester, C. M., Mar 5 2025, In: JAMA psychiatry. 82, 3, p. 264-273 10 p.
-
Multi-echo acquisition and thermal denoising advances precision functional imaging
Moser, J., Nelson, S. M., Koirala, S., Madison, T. J., Labonte, A. K., Carrasco, C. M., Feczko, E., Moore, L. A., Lundquist, J. T., Weldon, K. B., Grimsrud, G., Hufnagle, K., Ahmed, W., Myers, M. J., Adeyemo, B., Snyder, A., Gordon, E., Dosenbach, N. U. F., Tervo-Clemmens, B. & Larsen, B. & 7 others, , Jan 9 2025, In: Imaging Neuroscience. 3, imag_a_00426.
-
Neighborhood Resource Deprivation as a Predictor of Bullying Perpetration and Resource-Driven Conduct Symptoms
Perino, M. T., Sylvester, C. M., Rogers, C., Luby, J. L. & Barch, D. M., Jan 2025, In: Journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry. 64, 1, p. 53-64 12 p.
-
Prenatal social disadvantage is associated with alterations in functional networks at birth
Nielsen, A. N., Triplett, R. L., Bernardez, L. M., Tooley, U. A., Herzberg, M. P., Lean, R. E., Kaplan, S., Meyer, D., Kenley, J. K., Alexopoulos, D., Losielle, D., Latham, A., Smyser, T. A., Agrawal, A., Shimony, J. S., Jackson, J. J., Miller, J. P., Raichle, M. E., Warner, B. B. & Rogers, C. E. & 4 others, , Dec 10 2024, In: Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America. 121, 50, e2405448121.
-
Quantifying brain development in the HEALthy Brain and Child Development (HBCD) Study: The magnetic resonance imaging and spectroscopy protocol
Dean, D. C., Tisdall, M. D., Wisnowski, J. L., Feczko, E., Gagoski, B., Alexander, A. L., Edden, R. A. E., Gao, W., Hendrickson, T. J., Howell, B. R., Huang, H., Humphreys, K. L., Riggins, T., Sylvester, C. M., Weldon, K. B., Yacoub, E., Ahtam, B., Beck, N., Banerjee, S. & Boroday, S. & 73 others, , Dec 2024, In: Developmental Cognitive Neuroscience. 70, 101452.