Dr. Joseph J. Schildkraut, a Harvard psychiatrist whose studies of antidepressants and their effects on brain chemistry shed light on the biochemical basis of depression and mood disorders, died on June 26 in Boston. He was 72 and a resident of nearby Chestnut Hill.
Joseph J. Schildkraut
His death was announced by Harvard.
In the 1960's Dr. Schildkraut wrote what has become his principal research paper. It was a look at catecholamines, a class of naturally occurring compounds that act as messenger chemicals within the brain.
He studied one of the compounds, norepinephrine, in patients before and during treatment with antidepressants and found that depression inhibited its effectiveness as a chemical messenger, or neurotransmitter. He then used his findings to theorize broadly about the biochemical underpinnings of mental illnesses.
Those findings, published in 1965 in The American Journal of Psychiatry, "captured the imagination of the field and helped us to understand the biology of psychiatric disorders," said Dr. Alan I. Green, chairman of the psychiatry department at Dartmouth Medical School.
"One important implication from that paper was that you could then identify different subgroups of patients with similar disorders through the study of biochemical processes," added Dr. Green, a former collaborator with Dr. Schildkraut at Harvard.
Dr. Schildkraut went on to study the biochemical actions of antipsychotic drugs. He helped to found the Neuropsychopharmacology Laboratory at the Massachusetts Mental Health Center in Boston, where he worked to find clinical applications for his research.
He also developed an interest in the relationship between depression and artistic creativity, and wrote on the subject of suicide among the Abstract Expressionist artists of the New York School. He later helped edit a book of art history and psychology, "Depression and the Spiritual in Modern Art: Homage to Miró."
In a letter to The New York Times in 1994, Dr. Schildkraut observed that depression in artists "may have put them in touch with the inexplicable mystery at the very heart of the tragic and timeless art they aspired to produce."
Joseph Jacob Schildkraut was born in Brooklyn and earned his undergraduate and medical degrees from Harvard.
After working as a research psychiatrist at the National Institute of Mental Health, he became an assistant professor of psychiatry at Harvard in 1967. He was named a professor in 1974 and retired two years ago. He was editor in chief of The Journal of Psychiatric Research from 1982 to 1992.
Dr. Schildkraut is survived by his wife of 40 years, the former Betsy Beilenson; two sons, Mike, of Chicago, and Peter, of Chevy Chase, Md.; his mother, Shirley, of Merion Station, Pa.; and a sister, Shelley Gornish, also of Merion Station.
