Recent findings in psychiatric genetics have crystallized concerns that diagnostic categories used in the clinic map poorly onto the underlying biology. If we are to harness developments in genetics and neuroscience to understand disease mechanisms and develop new treatments, we need new approaches to patient stratification that recognize the complexity and continuous nature of psychiatric traits and that are not constrained by current categorical approaches. Recognizing this, the National Institute for Mental Health (NIMH) has developed a novel framework to encourage more research of this kind. The implications of these recent findings and funding policy developments for neuroscience research are considerable.