Local News in Brief : Irvine : UCI Gets $500,000 Grant for Psychiatric Research

UC Irvine’s College of Medicine has received a $500,000 grant for research into mental illness.

The funds from the Paul L. and Phyllis Wattis Foundation of San Francisco will be used in research by William Bunney, UCI’s chairman of psychiatry and human behavior.

“With support from concerned people, such as those at the Wattis Foundation, we are investigating the causes of schizophrenia and other tragic mental illnesses,” Bunney said.

Bunney, a resident of Laguna Beach, is internationally recognized for his pioneering work with lithium for treatment of manic-depressive illness. Under his direction, the UCI psychiatry department has been named by the World Health Organization as the official U.S. Center for Biological Psychiatry.