Leigh Ann Samsa sucessfully defended her thesis in a private defense on June 14th and a public defense on June 17th. CONGRATULATIONS Dr. Samsa!!

Congratulations to Dr. O'Brien on her retirement!! We THANK YOU for your many years of service with the department and happy to announce that you will remain an Adjunct Professor!

Congratulations to Dr. Goy on his retirement. We THANK YOU for your many years of service with our department and wish you much happiness in the future!!

Lin Xiao successfully defended her thesis in a private defense on April 4th and presented her public defense on April 22nd. CONGRATULATIONS Dr. Xiao!!

Graduate Students, Hailey Brighton (Jim Bear Lab) and Erica Cloer (Ben Major Lab) have received Dissertation Completion Fellowships! The Dissertation Completion Fellowship supports doctoral students in the final year of their dissertation and enables a student to focus full time on research and writing.

Jim Dunleavey successfully defended his thesis during his private defense on March 24th and presented his public defense on April 15th. CONGRATULATIONS Dr. Dunleavey!!

The results suggest further lines of research related to the effects of neurodevelopmentally critical genes on other kinds of neurons.

Spencer Smith was awarded a Human Frontier Science Program grant for the "real-time tracking and imaging of neuronal dynamics in freely moving vertebrates."

Huge Congratulations to Ben Major on his successful promotion to Associate Professor with Tenure!!

In a paper published in Nature Communications, Janet Berrios, a graduate student in the Philpot lab, discovered that the loss of UBE3A decreases the release of the GABA neurotransmitter and alters reward-seeking behavior in an important neural pathway once presumed to be principally regulated by the dopamine neurotransmitter.