Anahita Bassir Nia, MD

Anahita Bassir Nia, MD, joined Yale School of Medicine in July 2018 as Assistant Professor of Psychiatry, after completing her psychiatry residency at Mount Sinai Beth Israel, and her addiction psychiatry fellowship-academic track at Mount Sinai West, Icahn School of Medicine, New York.

Her research interests are, mainly, in translational research on addiction and mental health disorders. She is particularly interested in the biological effects of acute and chronic stress on developing substance use disorders, as well as, the effects of substance use on stress response and psychiatric symptoms. She has been focused on the use of cannabinoids (partial and full agonists) and endocannabinoid system dysregulations in relation to childhood trauma and substance use disorders, particularly opioid use disorder, as well as the role of endocannabinoid system in psychopathology of stress-related disorders.

She is also interested in the potential use of psychedelics in treatment of substance use disorder, particularly alcohol use disorder. She studies the potential effects of psychedelics N, N-Dimethyltryptamine (DMT) on alcohol use disorder and its underlying mechanism such as changes in neuroplasticity.