Faculty

Rui Peixoto, PhD

Rui Peixoto, PhD

Assistant Professor of Psychiatry

Contact Details

3811 O'Hara St.
Pittsburgh
 
PA
 
15213
Email
Website
Neurodevlab

Education & Training

PhD
Neuroscience, Universidade Nova de Lisboa
Neurobiology, Harvard Medical School

Selected Honors & Awards

Bridge to Independence Award, Simons Foundation Autism Research Initiative (SFARI)

Research Interests

Developmental neuroscience; Cortical and striatal development; Autism spectrum disorders
Selected Research Publications & Products
  1. Zhang P, Lu H, Peixoto RT, Pines MK, Ge Y, Oku S, Siddiqui TI, Xie Y, Wu W, Archer-Hartmann S, Yoshida K, Tanaka KF, Aricescu AR, Azadi P, Gordon AP, Sabatini BL, Wong ROL, and Craig AM. Heparan sulfate organizes neuronal synapses through neurexin partnerships. (2018) Cell 174(6):1450
  2. Peixoto RT, Wang W, Croney D, Kozorovitskiy Y, Sabatini BL (2016) Early hyperactivity and precocious maturation of corticostriatal circuits in Shank3B-/- mice. Nature Neuroscience 19(5):716-24
  3. Kozorovitskiy Y, Peixoto R, Wang W, Saunders A, Sabatini BL(2015) Neuromodulation of excitatory synaptogenesis in striatal development. eLife 10.7554/eLife.10111
  4. Peixoto RT, Kunz PA, Kwon H, Mabb AM, Sabatini BL, Philpot BD, Ehlers MD (2012) Trans-synaptic signaling by activity dependent cleavage of Neuroligin-1. Neuron 76(2):396-409.
  5. Kwon H, Kozorovitskiy Y, Oh WJ, Peixoto RT, Akhtar N, Saulnier JL, Gu C, Sabatini BL (2012) Neuroligin-1 dependent competition regulates cortical synaptogenesis and synapse number. Nature Neuroscience 15(12):1667-74

Education Interests

Research mentorship

Pitt Psychiatry’s 2024 Research Day, Part I: A Research and Networking Bonanza

Research Day 2024

The 22nd annual Department of Psychiatry Research Day, held on June 13, 2024, was the most highly attended Research Day ever, with 544 faculty members, trainees, and staff gathering at Soldiers & Sailors Memorial Hall & Museum on the University of Pittsburgh campus. Lunchtime Roundtables More than 260 individuals participated in or facilitated one of 19 roundtable discussion groups focused on topics including...

The Developmental Affective Neuroscience Symposium: Presenting Translational Research in Developmental Psychopathology

The Developmental Affective Neuroscience Symposium Collage

The Developmental Affective Neuroscience Symposium (DANS) presents recent translational research in developmental psychopathology. The 2023 DANS theme was “ Neurodevelopment of Regulatory Systems: A Focus on Emotions and Motivation,” featuring research focused on the development of neural networks and circuitries implicated in regulating or modulating neural response to emotionally or motivationally salient...

The Department of Psychiatry’s 20th Annual Research Day

The 20th annual Department of Psychiatry Research Day on June 9, 2022, represented a joyful reunion for more than 400 faculty members, trainees, and staff, who had not attended a large in-person event together since 2019. The morning session featured 110 posters at Soldiers & Sailors Memorial Hall & Museum in the Oakland section of Pittsburgh. In the afternoon, attendees gathered across the street at the University...

Now in Cell Reports: New Findings Related to Early Abnormal Striatal Development and Autism Spectrum Disorders

Dr. Rui Peixoto

Autism spectrum disorder (ASD) is characterized by cognitive and behavioral deficits that typically emerge before the age of three. While this distinctive developmental trajectory and the selective degradation of particular abilities suggest that ASD arises from impaired developmental processes affecting the maturation of specific neural circuits, the developmental stage at which circuit dysfunction associated with...

The Department of Psychiatry Welcomes New Faculty Member Rui Peixoto, PhD

Dr. Rui Peixoto

The Department of Psychiatry is pleased to announce that Rui Peixoto, PhD, has joined the Department as assistant professor. Dr. Peixoto received an undergraduate degree in Biochemistry from Universidade de Coimbra in Portugal in 2003 and earned his PhD in Neuroscience from Duke University Medical Center and the Universidade Nova de Lisboa in 2011. His graduate work with Dr. Michael Ehlers at Duke focused on...