Join the Northeast Node for the next installment of their Science Series: Using AI and Passive Data to Improve Digital Assessment and Treatment of Substance Use and Mental Health Disorders (September 24, 2026, 12-1pm ET). Presented by Nicholas C. Jacobson, PhD. Dr. Jacobson, PhD, is an Associate Professor of Biomedical Data Science and Psychiatry at Dartmouth’s Geisel School of Medicine, where he directs the AI and Mental Health: Innovation in Technology Guided Healthcare (AIM HIGH) Laboratory. He has published over 130 peer-reviewed papers (H-index: 44), with a large portion focused on using passively collected smartphone and wearable sensor data to detect psychiatric disorders, measure symptom severity, and predict real-time changes in mental health. His work spans data from over 10,000 participants across 100+ countries. In this talk, he will cover how these digital phenotyping methods have been applied within the CTN through the D-TECT study (CTN-0084-A2), his lab’s personalized digital therapeutics for co-occurring anxiety, depression, and substance use disorders, and the 6.5-year development of Therabot, a generative AI psychotherapy chatbot. Therabot was tested in the first randomized controlled trial of generative AI psychotherapy, published in the New England Journal of Medicine AI, where 210 participants showed large symptom reductions (d=0.63 to 0.90) and averaged over 6 hours of engagement across 24 days. He will close with implications for substance use treatment research. Register here Posted on August 31, 2026.

AHSR 2026 The 2026 Addiction Health Services Research (AHSR) Conference will be held October 5-7, 2026, in Salt Lake City, Utah, home of the Greater Intermountain Node. The conference brings together addiction researchers, policymakers, and treatment providers to discuss challenges and opportunities related to equity, access, effectiveness, and implementation of addiction services. Early bird registration ends September 4, 2026. Register by that date to save $100. The conference hotel is likely to sell out, so early booking is recommended. Visit the AHSR 2026 website Save the Date for the CTN Steering Committee Meeting Our Staff Retreat Our annual staff retreat was an action-packed visit to the Game Show Battle Rooms, where we faced off in games inspired by fan favorites like The Price Is Right, Wheel of Fortune, and more, bringing plenty of laughs, suspense, and excitement along the way. We left feeling energized, motivated, and even more connected as a team! Posted on August 21, 2026

Join the CTN Health Systems Node for an upcoming virtual seminar: On Thursday, September 3, 2026 (10am PT, 1pm ET), Tessa Matson, PhD, MPH, Collaborative Scientist at Kaiser Permanente Washington Health Research Institute, will present findings from a CTN implementation trial on factors that distinguished clinics that successfully increased opioid use disorder treatment from those that did not. Connect via Microsoft Teams. Meeting ID: 250 658 877 216 6 | Passcode: B8jq2m9A.