Welcome to the GPN!

The Graduate Program in Neuroscience (GPN) at the University of Minnesota is a large interdisciplinary PhD program, made up of over 125 faculty members. Our goal is to provide students with a broad and deep understanding of Neuroscience, ranging from the molecular and genetic level to computational. Due to its interdisciplinary nature, our program is a highly collaborative and collegial environment in which to train.

Congratulations to our newest PhD awardee Dr. Rebecca Speltz Paiz!

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We are an interdisciplinary program, with a productive and engaged faculty, committed to providing a supportive environment so that students can achieve their full potential.  Our faculty are from 30 different  departments and have a wide range of research interests and expertise. A complete list of faculty can be found here. We support a number of programs that bring neuroscience into the community, such as Brain Awareness Week, Brains at the State Fair, and the Minnesota State Brain Bee.

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Recent 2020 GPN Publications
  • Eisinger KRT, Chapp AD, Swanson SP, Tam D, Lopresti NM, Larson EB, Thomas MJ, Lanier LM, Mermelstein PG. Caveolin-1 regulates medium spiny neuron structural and functional plasticity. Psychopharmacology (Berl). 2020 Jun 2. doi: 10.1007/s00213-020-05564-2.
  • Wu MM, Thayer SA. HIV Tat protein impairs CB1 receptor-mediated presynaptic inhibition at excitatory but not inhibitory synapses. eNeuro. 2020 May 29. pii: ENEURO.0119-20.2020.
  • Lyons CE, Bartolomucci A. Stress and Alzheimer's disease: A senescence link? Neurosci Biobehav Rev. 2020 May 24. pii: S0149-7634(20)30413-9.
  • Linn-Evans ME, Petrucci MN, Amundsen Huffmaster SL, Chung JW, Tuite PJ, Howell MJ, Videnovic A, MacKinnon CD. REM sleep without atonia is associated with increased rigidity in patients with mild to moderate Parkinson's disease. Clin Neurophysiol. 2020 May 12. pii: S1388-2457(20)30172-3.
  • Gradinati V, Baruffaldi F, Abbaraju S, Laudenbach M, Amin R, Gilger B, Velagaleti P, Pravetoni M. Polymer-mediated delivery of vaccines to treat opioid use disorders and to reduce opioid-induced toxicity. Vaccine. 2020 May 19. pii: S0264-410X(20)30646-0.
  • Tsilibary EC, Souto EP, Kratzke M, James LM, Engdahl BE, Georgopoulos AP. Vaccine-induced adverse effects in cultured neuroblastoma 2A (N2A) cells duplicate toxicity of serum from patients with Gulf War Illness (GWI) and are prevented in the presence of specific anti-vaccine antibodies. Vaccines (Basel). 2020 May 18;8(2). pii: E232.
  • Teravskis PJ, Ashe KH, Liao D. The accumulation of Tau in postsynaptic structures: A common feature in multiple neurodegenerative diseases? Neuroscientist. 2020 May 9:1073858420916696.
  • Speltz R, Lunzer MM, Shueb S, Akgun E, Reed R, Kalyuzhny A, Portoghese PS, Simone DA. The bivalent ligand, MMG22, reduces neuropathic pain after nerve injury without the side effects of traditional opioids. Pain. 2020 Apr 27. doi: 10.1097/j.pain.0000000000001902.
  • Rynes ML, Ghanbari L, Schulman DS, Linn S, Laroque M, Dominguez J, Navabi ZS, Sherman P, Kodandaramaiah SB. Assembly and operation of an open-source, computer numerical controlled (CNC) robot for performing cranial microsurgical procedures. Nat Protoc. 2020 May 13. doi: 10.1038/s41596-020-0318-4.
  • Vizioli L, De Martino F, Petro LS, Kersten D, Ugurbil K, Yacoub E, Muckli L. Multivoxel pattern of blood oxygen level dependent activity can be sensitive to stimulus specific fine scale responses. Sci Rep. 2020 May 5;10(1):7565.
  • Swain Y, Muelken P, Skansberg A, Lanzdorf D, Haave Z, LeSage MG, Gewirtz JC, Harris AC. Higher anhedonia during withdrawal from initial opioid exposure is protective against subsequent opioid self-administration in rats. Psychopharmacology (Berl). 2020 May 9. doi: 10.1007/s00213-020-05532-w.
  • Hirad AA, Bazarian JJ, Merchant-Borna K, Garcea FE, Heilbronner S, Paul D, Hintz EB, van Wijngaarden E, Schifitto G, Wright DW, Espinoza TR, Mahon BZ. A common neural signature of brain injury in concussion and subconcussion. Sci Adv. 2019 Aug 7;5(8):eaau3460.
  • Breedlove JL, St-Yves G, Olman CA, Naselaris T. Generative feedback explains distinct brain activity codes for seen and mental images. Curr Biol. 2020 Apr 30. pii: S0960-9822(20)30494-2.
  • Touchette JC, Moen JK, Robinson JM, Lee AM. Enhancement of alcohol aversion by the nicotinic acetylcholine receptor drug sazetidine-A. Addict Biol. 2020 Apr 24:e12908.
  • Hasz BM, Redish AD. Dorsomedial prefrontal cortex and hippocampus represent strategic context even while simultaneously changing representation throughout a task session. Neurobiol Learn Mem. 2020 Apr 7:107215.
  • Avanzino L, Cherif A, Crisafulli O, Carbone F, Zenzeri J, Morasso P, Abbruzzese G, Pelosin E, Konczak J. Tactile and proprioceptive dysfunction differentiates cervical dystonia with and without tremor. Neurology. 2020 Feb 11;94(6):e639-e650.
  • Filip P, Svatkova A, Carpenter AF, Eberly LE, Nestrasil I, Nissi MJ, Michaeli S, Mangia S. Rotating frame MRI relaxations as markers of diffuse white matter abnormalities in multiple sclerosis. Neuroimage Clin. 2020 Mar 2;26:102234.
  • Lixandrão MC, Stinear JW, Rich T, Chen CY, Feyma T, Meekins GD, Gillick BT. EMG breakthrough during cortical silent period in congenital hemiparesis: a descriptive case series. Braz J Phys Ther. 2020;24(1):20-29.
  • Kofuji P, Araque A. G-protein-coupled receptors in astrocyte-neuron communication. Neuroscience. 2020 Mar 26. pii: S0306-4522(20)30177-9.
  • Gamache JE, Kemper L, Steuer E, Leinonen-Wright K, Choquette JM, Hlynialuk C, Benzow K, Vossel KA, Xia W, Koob MD, Ashe KH. Developmental pathogenicity of 4-repeat human tau is lost with the P301L mutation in genetically matched tau-transgenic mice. J Neurosci. 2020;40(1):220-236.
  • Liu X, Engel SA. Higher-level meta-adaptation mitigates visual distortions produced by lower-level adaptation. Psychol Sci. 2020 Apr 29:956797620907090.
  • Lyu L, He S, Jiang Y, Engel SA, Bao M. Natural-scene-based steady-state visual evoked potentials reveal effects of short-term monocular deprivation. Neuroscience. 2020 Mar 27;435:10-21.
  • Vergeer M, Engel SA. Control of visual adaptation depends upon task. PLoS One. 2020 Feb 27;15(2):e0229343
  • Georgieff MK. Iron deficiency in pregnancy. Am J Obstet Gynecol. 2020 Mar 14. pii: S0002-9378(20)30328-8.
  • Chao OY, de Velasco EMF, Pathak SS, Maitra S, Zhang H, Duvick L, Wickman K, Orr HT, Hirai H, Yang YM. Targeting inhibitory cerebellar circuitry to alleviate behavioral deficits in a mouse model for studying idiopathic autism. Neuropsychopharmacology. 2020;45(7):1159-1170.
  • Razzoli M, Lindsay A, Law ML, Chamberlain CM, Southern WM, Berg M, Osborn J, Engeland WC, Metzger JM, Ervasti JM, Bartolomucci A. Social stress is lethal in the mdx model of Duchenne muscular dystrophy. EBioMedicine. 2020 Mar 3:102700.
  • Wozniak JR, Fink BA, Fuglestad AJ, Eckerle JK, Boys CJ, Sandness KE, Radke JP, Miller NC, Lindgren C, Brearley AM, Zeisel SH, Georgieff MK. Four-year follow-up of a randomized controlled trial of choline for neurodevelopment in fetal alcohol spectrum disorder. J Neurodev Disord. 2020 Mar 12;12(1):9.
  • Cash-Padgett T, Hayden B. Behavioural variability contributes to over-staying in patchy foraging. Biol Lett. 2020;16(3):20190915.
  • Puig O, Fisher M, Loewy R, Miley K, Ramsay IS, Carter CS, Ragland JD, Niendam T, Vinogradov S. Early- versus adult-onset achizophrenia as a predictor of response to neuroscience-informed cognitive training. J Clin Psychiatry. 2020 Mar 3;81(2). pii: 18m12369.
  • Liu P, Smith BR, Montonye ML, Kemper LJ, Leinonen-Wright K, Nelson KM, Higgins L, Guerrero CR, Markowski TW, Zhao X, Petersen AJ, Knopman DS, Petersen RC, Ashe KH. A soluble truncated tau species related to cognitive dysfunction is elevated in the brain of cognitively impaired human individuals. Sci Rep. 2020 Mar 2;10(1):3869.
  • Nielson JL, Cooper SR, Seabury S, Finazzi S, Luciani D, Fabio A, Temkin N, Ferguson AR, the TRACK-TBI Investigators. Statistical guidelines for handling missing values in traumatic brain injury clinical research. J Neurotrauma. 2020 Feb 1. doi: 10.1089/neu.2019.6702.
  • Aman JE, Johnson LA, Sanabria DE, Wang J, Patriat R, Hill M, Marshall E, MacKinnon CD, Cooper SE, Schrock LE, Park MC, Harel N, Vitek JL. Directional deep brain stimulation leads reveal spatially distinct oscillatory activity in the globus pallidus internus of Parkinson's disease patients. Neurobiol Dis. 2020 Feb 20:104819.
  • Lefevre EM, Pisansky MT, Toddes C, Baruffaldi F, Pravetoni M, Tian L, Kono TJY, Rothwell PE. Interruption of continuous opioid exposure exacerbates drug-evoked adaptations in the mesolimbic dopamine system. Neuropsychopharmacology. 2020 Feb 20. doi: 10.1038/s41386-020-0643-x.
  • O'Herron P, Levy M, Woodward JJ, Kara P. An unexpected dependence of cortical depth in shaping neural responsiveness and selectivity in mouse visual cortex. eNeuro. 2020 Feb 7. pii: ENEURO.0497-19.2020.
  • Collins AL, Saunders BT. Heterogeneity in striatal dopamine circuits: Form and function in dynamic reward seeking. J Neurosci Res. 2020;98(6):1046-1069.
  • Boroda E, Sponheim SR, Fiecas M, Lim KO. Transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) elicits stimulus-specific enhancement of cortical plasticity. Neuroimage. 2020 Feb 4:116598.
  • Torres Jimenez N, Lines JW, Kueppers RB, Kofuji P, Wei H, Rankila A, Coyle JT, Miller RF, McLoon LK. Electroretinographic abnormalities and sex differences detected with mesopic adaptation in a mouse model of schizophrenia: a and b wave analysis. Invest Ophthalmol Vis Sci. 2020 Feb 7;61(2):16.
  • Feord RC, Sumner ME, Pusdekar S, Kalra L, Gonzalez-Bellido PT, Wardill TJ. Cuttlefish employ stereopsis to strike at prey. Sci Adv. 2020 Jan 8;6(2):eaay6036.
  • Supple J, Pinto-Benito D, Khoo C, Wardill T, Fabian ST, Liu M, Pusdekar S, Galeano D, Pan J, Jiang S, Wang Y, Liu L, Peng H, Olberg RM, Gonzalez-Bellido PT. Binocular encoding in the damselfly premotor target tracking system. Curr Biol. 2020;30(4):645-656.e4.
  • Hammell AE, Helwig NE, Kaczkurkin AN, Sponheim SR, Lissek S. The temporal course of over-generalized conditioned threat expectancies in posttraumatic stress disorder. Behav Res Ther. 2020 Jan;124:103513.
  • Nelson NW, Disner SG, Anderson CR, Doane BM, McGuire K, Lamberty GJ, Hoelzle J, Sponheim SR. last concussion and posttraumatic stress as predictors of postcombat neuropsychological functioning in OEF/OIF/OND veterans. Neuropsychology. 2020;34(1):116-126.
  • Longenecker JM, Krueger RF, Sponheim SR. Personality traits across the psychosis spectrum: A Hierarchical Taxonomy of Psychopathology conceptualization of clinical symptomatology. Personal Ment Health. 2020;14(1):88-105.
  • Streng ML, Krook-Magnuson E. The cerebellum and epilepsy. Epilepsy Behav. 2020 Feb 5:106909.
  • Ramsay IS, Roach BJ, Fryer S, Fisher M, Loewy R, Ford JM, Vinogradov S, Mathalon DH. Increased global cognition correlates with increased thalamo-temporal connectivity in response to targeted cognitive training for recent onset schizophrenia. Schizophr Res. 2020 Jan 29. pii: S0920-9964(20)30036-0.
  • Surti TS, Vinogradov S, Bell MD, Wexler BE. Improvement on visual cognitive training exercises in schizophrenia is present but less robust than in healthy individuals. Schizophr Res. 2020 Jan 9. pii: S0920-9964(19)30528-6.
  • Vinogradov S. Standardizing measures for early psychosis: What are our goals? Biol Psychiatry Cogn Neurosci Neuroimaging. 2020 Jan;5(1):4-6.
  • Dale CL, Brown EG, Herman AB, Hinkley LBN, Subramaniam K, Fisher M, Vinogradov S, Nagarajan SS. Intervention-specific patterns of cortical function plasticity during auditory encoding in people with schizophrenia. Schizophr Res. 2020 Jan;215:241-249.
  • Corkrum M, Covelo A, Lines J, Bellocchio L, Pisansky M, Loke K, Quintana R, Rothwell PE, Lujan R, Marsicano G, Martin ED. Thomas MJ, Kofuji P, Araque A. Dopamine-evoked synaptic regulation in the nucleus accumbens requires astrocyte activity. Neuron. 2020 Mar 18;105(6):1036-1047.
  • DeNicola AL, Park MY, Crowe DA, MacDonald AW 3rd, Chafee MV. Differential roles of MD thalamus and prefrontal cortex in decision making and state representation in a cognitive control task measuring deficits in schizophrenia. J Neurosci. 2020;40(8):1650-1667
  • Lyons CE, Razzoli M, Larson E, Svedberg D, Frontini A, Cinti S, Vulchanova L, Sanders M, Thomas M, Bartolomucci A. Optogenetic-induced sympathetic neuromodulation of brown adipose tissue thermogenesis. FASEB J. 2020;34(2):2765-2773.
  • Blohm G, Kording KP, Schrater PR. A how-to-model guide for neuroscience. eNeuro. 2020 Feb 14;7(1). pii: ENEURO.0352-19.2019.
  • Yoo SBM, Tu JC, Piantadosi ST, Hayden BY. The neural basis of predictive pursuit. Nat Neurosci. 2020;23(2):252-259.
  • DeBaker MC, Moen JK, Robinson JM, Wickman K, Lee AM. Unequal interactions between alcohol and nicotine co-consumption: suppression and enhancement of concurrent drug intake. Psychopharmacology (Berl). 2020 Apr;237(4):967-978.
  • Auerbach M, Georgieff MK. Guidelines for iron deficiency in pregnancy: hope abounds. Br J Haematol.;188(6):814-816.
  • Yoo SBM, Hayden BY. The transition from evaluation to selection involves neural subspace reorganization in core reward regions. Neuron. 2020 Feb 19;105(4):712-724.e4.

GPN News

Congratulations to Dr. Singh on successfully defending his PhD thesis June 14, 2019

Dr. Balvindar Singh successfully defended his PhD thesis om 6/14/19: "Investigating the mechanisms underlying synaptic and cognitive deficits in alpha-synucleinopathies"

Balvindar Singh Thesis Defense

A clinical case-control comparison of epidermal innervation density in Rett syndrome

A clinical case-control comparison of epidermal innervation density in Rett syndrome.

Symons FJ, Barney CC, Byiers BJ, McAdams BD, Foster SXYL, Feyma TJ, Wendelschafer-Crabb G, Kennedy WR.

Brain Behav. 2019 May;9(5):e01285. doi: 10.1002/brb3.1285. Epub 2019 Apr 13.

Cover of Brain and Behavior for this month produced by alum Brian McAdams

 

Congratulations to Dr. Rebecca Speltz Paiz on successfully defending her PhD thesis May 29, 2020

Congratulations to Dr. Rebecca Speltz Paiz on successfully defending her PhD thesis May 29 2020!

Picture of Caitlin Durkee

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