Jong Yoon

Jong H. Yoon, MD, is a clinician-scientist who is focused on applying novel neuroimaging methods to discover the brain mechanisms of schizophrenia and stimulant abuse disorder, as well as developing mechanism based treatments for these conditions. He is dually appointed at the Palo Alto VA, where he serves as the Director of the Repetitive Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation (rTMS) Neuromodulation Clinic. As a cognitive neuroscientist, he has led a number of federally funded projects developing and utilizing advanced in vivo neuroimaging methods. HIs work is particularly interested in investigating impairments in the function of the basal ganglia, which gives rise to cognitive and information processing deficits and psychosis in schizophrenia and other psychiatric conditions. Towards these ends, he has been developing novel fMRI methods to accurately measure the functional properties of basal ganglia nuclei. Dr. Yoon is also developing new neuroimaging approaches for indexing brain function and dysfunction, including methods for measuring task-evoked GABA levels in the brain and applying a newly developed PET tracer for determining synaptic health in humans and in disease. He received his medical degree from the New York University School of Medicine and residency training in adult psychiatry at the Langley Porter Psychiatric Institute at University of California San Francisco. He completed a post-doctoral fellowship in cognitive neuroscience and functional neuroimaging at University of California Berkeley.