Amir Erez, PhD
Dr. Erez earned his Ph.D. and M. S. at the Industrial and Labor Relations School at Cornell University. He attended the Hebrew University of Jerusalem where he earned his B. A. in Business Administration and Philosophy and an M. A. in Philosophy. His research focuses on how positive moods and positive personality, influence individuals thought processes, motivation, and work behaviors. Dr. Erez also investigates how negative work behaviors such as rudeness and disrespect affect individuals’ performance and cognition. He has published this research in scholarly journals including Journal of Applied Psychology, Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, Academy of Management Journal, Personnel Psychology, Personality and Individual Differences, Human Performance, and Journal of Organizational Behavior.
Andreas Keil, PhD
Dr. Keil obtained his PhD in Psychology in 2000. He is a current faculty member in NIMH Center for the Study of Emotion and Attention. He studies the way the human brain and body adapt to environmental challenges over time, on the scale of milliseconds, minutes, hours, days, and across the lifespan. Understanding these changes is now considered a hallmark in the behavioral and neural sciences and it holds promises for answering fundamental science questions as well as clinical applications. Dr. Keil’s research program combines basic human neuroscience research with clinical and translational questions, identifying specific mechanisms of Psychiatric and Neurological disorders. Keil has been particularly interested in changing the way electrophysiological data (for example EEG brain waves) in humans are recorded, analyzed, and interpreted.
Darlene Kertes, PhD
Darlene Kertes is an Associate Professor in the Department of Psychology and is affiliated with the University of Florida Genetics Institute. Dr. Kertes focuses on the antecedents and consequences of stress in health and development. Her research examines the role of life experiences and epigenetic processes on activity of a stress-sensitive neuroendocrine system, the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenocortical system. Dr. Kertes further studies the genetic and gene-environment interaction effects on stress-related emotional and health outcomes from childhood through adulthood. Dr. Kertes completed a Ph.D. in child psychology from the Institute of Child Development at the University of Minnesota and an NRSA Post-Doctoral Fellowship at the Virginia Institute for Psychiatric and Behavioral Genetics, Virginia Commonwealth University.
Dr. Kertes has received several nationally competitive awards to pursue her work, including awards from the National Science Foundation, Fulbright Foundation, and the National Institutes of Health. Dr. Kertes also served at the National Institutes of Health as a Science and Technology Policy Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) and Society for Research in Child Development (SRCD), where she was involved in launching the Genes, Environment and Health Initiative.
Irene A Malaty MD
Michael S Okun MD
Kay Roussos-Ross M.D.
Heather Simpson, MOT, OTR/L
Heather graduated with a B.S. in Exercise and Sport Sciences with a minor in Early Education from the University of Florida in 2007. Following her Bachelor’s degree, Heather received a Master’s in Occupational Therapy, in 2009, from the University of Florida. To complete her education, she obtained her post-professional clinical doctorate from the University of St. Augustine for Health Sciences in 2017. Since completion of graduate school, she has worked in a variety of settings including outpatient neurology, inpatient rehab and outpatient pediatric rehabilitation. In 2014, Heather transitioned to the UF Health Center for Movement Disorders and Neurorestoration to work with both the pediatric and adult populations affected with movement disorders.