Van de Water, PhD

Dr. Van de Water has a broad background in clinical immunology and immunopathology, with specific training and expertise in the gestational immune environment. Over the past 18 years, she expanded her research to include the immunobiological aspects associated with autism, which includes the maternal gestational immune environment, and how perturbation during gestation can impact the developing brain. Dr. Van de Water’s laboratory has worked to successfully understand the maternal cellular immune response and the humoral immune response during pregnancy and how dysregulation in these systems relates to neurobehavioral disorders such as autism and schizophrenia. Her group discovered the role of maternal auto-antibodies in the development of autism spectrum disorder that has led to the definition of a new sub-phenotype of ASD arising through this mechanism. In addition, she is a Co-Investigator on the UC Davis Conte Center studying neuroimmune mechanisms of psychiatric disorders including schizophrenia, and is PI of Project 1. In addition, Dr. Van de Water is currently the Co-Director of the NICHD-funded MIND Institute Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities Research Center, for which she heads the Molecular and Biological Analysis Core and is PI of the project embedded in the IDDRC.