Jeannie Beckham, PhD, received the 2025 John B. Barnwell Award—the Veterans Affairs Office of Research & Development’s highest honor for outstanding achievement in clinical science. The award is given in recognition of scientific contributions that change clinical practice for veterans.
Beckham is a tenured professor in psychiatry and behavioral sciences and co-director of the department’s Behavioral Medicine & Neurosciences Division. At the VA Durham Health Care System, she’s a senior research career scientist, co-director of the Research Core and director of the Genetics Laboratory at the VA Mid-Atlantic Mental Illness Research, Education & Clinical Center.
Beckham has led an independent research program focused on the psychological and physical health consequences of posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) that has been continuously funded by VA and the National Institute of Health since 1992. She has written nearly 500 peer reviewed scientific publications.
She has led the field in identifying the underlying mechanisms associated with smoking and smoking relapse in veterans with PTSD. She has also developed and tested innovative interventions and models of care to improve smoking cessation outcomes.
In recent years, Dr. Beckham extended her work to improve functional outcomes of veterans with PTSD who are misusing other drugs (e.g., cannabis, alcohol) and to prevent veteran suicide. She worked alongside a team of researchers assembled by the Million Veteran Program with the goal of improving the prediction of suicide among veterans. Her team identified genetic markers of suicide attempts and discovered several highly relevant biological pathways that may be involved in the pathogenesis of suicidal behavior.
In collaboration with a larger VA team, Beckham’s work is now focused on translating discoveries in psychiatric genetics, natural language processing, and geospatial analyses to improve the VA predictive suicide prevention algorithm.
“The overall significance of Dr. Beckham's research in the areas of PTSD, suicide prevention, smoking and smoking cessation, substance abuse, and, more recently, psychiatric genetics is extraordinary,” said Grant Huang, PhD, acting chief research and development officer for the VA Office of Research & Development.
“The overall significance of Dr. Beckham's research in the areas of PTSD, suicide prevention, smoking and smoking cessation, substance abuse, and, more recently, psychiatric genetics is extraordinary.”
— Grant Huang, PhD