Adriana Di Martino, MD

Adriana Di Martino, MD, is an internationally recognized autism researcher and the founding research director for the Autism Center at the Child Mind Institute.

Dr. Di Martino has a long-standing research interest in autism spectrum disorder and how to best understand its neurobiology using brain imaging and a range of other clinical and cognitive approaches. Her study places a particular emphasis on detecting autism-related differences in brain connectivity that emerge in early childhood, with the goal of identifying objective biological markers that can one day be used to improve early intervention efforts and the selection of treatments.

In order to accelerate the pace of autism research, Dr. Di Martino established and directs the Autism Brain Imaging Data Exchange (ABIDE), which aggregates and shares functional and structural brain imaging data from laboratories around the world. The datasets made available to the scientific community by ABIDE have attracted a broad range of researchers to the study of autism, with expertise ranging from neuroscience and psychology to statistics, mathematics and engineering. New insights are emerging though the studies of ABIDE at a rate of more than a publication per month.

Dr. Di Martino is also a leader in efforts to recognize and understand overlaps in the neural bases of other neurodevelopmental conditions that commonly co-occur with autism, such as attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder. Insights from this work are helping to provide a better understanding of differences in the clinical presentation of autism among individuals, as well as variations in the responses of treatment.

Dr. Di Martino is one of our nation’s most prolific researchers in the neuroimaging of autism, with publications in the most scientifically respected journals in the field of psychiatry, including the JAMA-Psychiatry, American Journal of Psychiatry, Biological Psychiatry and Molecular Psychiatry. She has also received honors and funding support from the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) and the Simons Foundation and has been invited to lecture at multiple national and international scientific conferences.

• Associate Professor of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, Department of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, Hassenfeld Children’s Hospital, NYU Langone (2016-2018)
• Leon Levy Assistant Professor of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, Department of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, Hassenfeld Children’s Hospital, NYU Langone (2010-2016)
• Leon Levy Research Assistant Professor of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, Child Study Center, NYU Langone (2009-2010)
• Research Director, Autism Spectrum Disorder Research and Clinical Program, Hassenfeld Children’s Hospital at NYU Langone, Department of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, Child Study Center, NYU Langone (2014-2018)
• Associate Director, Phyllis Green and Randolph Cowen Institute for Pediatric Neuroscience, Child Study Center, NYU Langone (2011-2014)
• Assistant Director of Research Clinical Operations, Phyllis Green and Randolph Cowen Institute for Pediatric Neuroscience, Child Study Center, NYU Langone Medical Center (2008-2011)

• Child and Adolescent Neuropsychiatry Resident, Universita’ degli Studi di Cagliari, School of Medicine, Cagliari, Italy
• Child and Adolescent Psychopharmacology Fellow, Universita’ degli Studi di Cagliari, School of Medicine, Cagliari, Italy
• Visiting Fellow, Miami Children’s Hospital
• Visiting Fellow, National Health Service, Bologna, Italy
• Research Fellow, Universita’ degli Studi di Cagliari, School of Medicine, Cagliari, Italy
• Postdoctoral Training, NYU Child Study Center

• MD, Universita’ degli Studi di Cagliari, School of Medicine, Cagliari, Italy
• Maturita’ Classica, Liceo Classico Dettori, Cagliari, Italy