She received two Life Sciences grants from the Trust totaling $107,000 to investigate the influence of the metabolic and dietary environment on behavioral regulation. In 2016 Dr. Sullivan led a project in collaboration with researchers at Oregon Health and Science University to win a five-year, $3,700,000 grant from NIH. The grant enabled her and her collaborators to study the impact of maternal obesity and a high-fat diet on the mental health and brain development of offspring, using a non-human primate model. This work is especially relevant given that two-thirds of pregnant women in the United States are overweight or obese. Dr. Sullivan publishes regularly in the Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, Scientific Reports and Obesity.