David Gil Amaral[1] is a professor of psychiatry at the University of California, Davis, United States, and since 1998 has been the research director at the M.I.N.D.
From 1977 to 1980, Amaral was a National Institutes of Health postdoctoral fellow with Dr. W. Maxwell Cowan at the Department of Anatomy & Neurobiology, Washington University School of Medicine.
Amaral's research team is dedicated to understanding the biological and behavioral features of autism, with the goal of prevention and decreased disability.
After raising additional funds and building a state-of-the-art facility in Sacramento, California, the institute has become one the premier autism research centers in the world.
Started in 2006, this project involves over 400 families as of 2015 and is determining unique features of brain development in children as young as two years of age.