Anyone who knows me knows I have absolutely zero chill about this. I’ve loved stepping into this role this semester & I’m looking forward to helping to catalyze neuroscience research excellence at Penn State

This babe is finally out.
nature.com/articles/s4146…

It was a tremendous privilege to spend some time in DC telling our elected officials about the impact of our BRAIN Initiative project on depression DBS and stressing the critical need for robust research funding.

Happy to see this out in Neuron. Huikun Wang, a staff scientist in our lab, demonstrates that ventromedial prefrontal cortical dynorphin signaling constrains threat-driven passive defensive behavior and switches in network states. Thread below.

cell.com/neuron/abstrac…

Sunset before the final session of the 2024 Basal Ganglia GRC. This week has given me a lot of perspective on how far we have come since I first started working in this field 20 (!!!) years ago, and how much there still is to learn.

New preprint, on 'sequence filtering'.
Led by Ciana Deveau, Z Zhou.
We see this as a key step forw on how cortex works.

All cortical areas have dense exc-exc recurrent connectivity.
What do these connections do, esp in sensory ctx?

Our data say: they do dynamics/time.
1/4

So proud Hugo Tejeda 🇲🇽 ❤️for being selected & invited by the U.S. National Academy of Sciences to participate in the 34th Kavli Frontiers US Symposium in Science in Irvine CA this week! National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) Joshua A. Gordon NIH Intramural nasonline.org/programs/kavli…

Our biology dept is hiring. Come join us in our amazing city and be a part of our vibrant growing scientific community. Please RT

Happy International Day of Women and Girls in Science! May the next generation be as excited for lab coats, gloves, and experiments as this little bug! 👩🏼‍🔬🌟

At long last I am thrilled to share my first first-author paper 🌟 Here we show the magic of the PFC in processing, computing, and coordinating long-range circuit responses to vicarious fear. Big thanks to all who made this work possible 🧠🐭

nature.com/articles/s4158…

Check out the brilliant Shana Silverstein's nature publication fresh off the press!!
nature.com/articles/s4158…

Celebrating Mario Penzo’s recent tenure at NIMH. Congrats Mario!

Come and work with us in Sunny London! We have up to two postdoctoral positions to investigate the cellular, circuit and synaptic basis of how internal states such as hunger and thirst can be used to guide behaviour. Apply until Feb 8th here: ucl.ac.uk/work-at-ucl/se…

New paper online! In 2018, we found a human brain signal that tracks real time fluctuations in mood/anxiety. Now Adam Jackson back-translates this biomarker to mice, dissects its circuit mechanisms, & tests its causal relationship to emotional state. 🧵1/6 authors.elsevier.com/sd/article/S08…

Happy to share a new preprint from the lab. Here we show that prefrontal cortical dynorphin peptidergic transmission regulates threat-inducef behavioral and prefrontal cortical network transitions.

Prefrontal cortical dynorphin peptidergic transmission constrains threat-driven behavioral and network states biorxiv.org/cgi/content/sh… #biorxiv_neursci

Celebrating the holidays in style with Kari Johnson’s delicious cocktails
🎄❄️🎁❤️

I am very excited about this. A primer on fiber photometry that came out of a fun fun collaboration with some of my favourite neuroscientists... I am gonna miss our 6:30am meetings :)

sciencedirect.com/science/articl…

Today would have been my brother’s 38th birthday. Can you make an appointment to get your skin checked?

⬇️ find a dermatolgoist here ⬇️
skincancer.org/treatment-reso…

Feel free to laugh & smile at how my mon dressed us.

Congrats to our new Associate Members at ⁦ACNP⁩ #ACNP2023 !!! 🎉 Welcome!!