Karen David, Ph.D.

Karen David is a Program Director with the goals of promoting team science, non-traditional experimental systems in neuroscience, fundamental neuroscience, and the integration across scales to solve complex systems neuroscience questions. She leverages the wide breadth of her training and experience to administer a portfolio that spans approaches from molecular to systems. 

Karen leads the R34, R01, and eTeamBCP U01 funding opportunities in the Circuits and Integrated Approaches portfolio of the BRAIN initiative. The overall goal of these programs is to understand behavior and function at the level of neural activity and circuits. With NINDS, she led the creation of the new team science funding opportunity: the NINDS Collaborative Opportunities for Multidisciplinary, Bold, and Innovative Neuroscience (COMBINE) program, which she currently co-leads with Cory Kelly. This COMBINE program, as part of the NINDS Strategic Plan for Research, is designed to support interdisciplinary research teams to achieve transformative goals that could not be met by individual or parallel efforts.  

She joined NINDS in 2013,has served the BRAIN Initiative since inception, and is the co-lead of BRAIN Team E (Integrative and Systems Neuroscience). Karen has served NINDS in a range of capacities over the years including Project Officer, Scientific Review Officer, Program Analyst, and her current role as Program Director . Karen has also worked on various special projects including coordinating the review activities of the Biospecimen Repository Acquisition Committee (BRAC) for the Parkinson's Disease Biomarkers Program. She also previously managed the BRAIN Initiative training awards (NINDS-assigned). Before joining NIH,  Karen did her postdoctoral fellowship in Molecular Biology and Genetics at the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine. She earned  a Ph.D. in Cellular and Molecular Medicine from the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine and a B.S. from the University of the Philippines.