UTDNeuroscience

🧠 Join us this Saturday for The Science of your Brain’s Superpowers outreach event! 🔬

Discover how the brain controls your body, thoughts, and senses and how understanding it can unlock real-life superpowers like focus, memory, and quick reflexes. Conduct hands-on experiments, explore the secrets of neurons, and prepare to unleash your full Brainpower!

🎉 Congratulations to PhD student Hailey Welch! She recently received a Ruth L. Kirschstein National Research Service Award Individual Predoctoral Fellowship from the .

Additionally, she published her first, first-author paper in Cell Reports in November. Congrats again and great job!

Read the news article: https://utd.link/3l6

Check out the paper: https://utd.link/3l7

✨ Huge congratulations to Dr. Puja Parekh, assistant professor of neuroscience at UT Dallas, on receiving a prestigious Young Investigator Grant from the Brain & Behavior Research Foundation (BBRF)! 🧠🌟

Her research explores the intricate relationship between the brain's reward and effort systems, and how stress shapes our motivation. With a focus on the nucleus accumbens, a key region involved in reward, motivation, and resilience, this two-year BBRF grant will support Dr. Parekh's work to uncover critical neural and genetic signatures that could guide future therapies for depression and other psychiatric conditions. 💡🔬

We hosted Andrea Nackley, PhD, last week and she presented a great seminar: "Neuro-adipo-immune axis of chronic primary pain".

In this seminar, Dr. Nackley revealed new mechanisms of chronic primary pain conditions (CPPCs) in human and mouse. Check out one of her recent publications, "A mouse model of chronic primary pain that integrates clinically relevant genetic vulnerability, stress, and minor injury"
at https://utd.link/3hl.

Every Thursday from 4-5pm in CRA 12.110 we host a seminar series that is open to the public!

🤯 Good news for and PTSD patients! In a phase one trial conducted and Baylor University Medical Center, participants received vagus nerve stimulation (VNS) paired with traditional therapy. Researchers found that this paired treatment eliminated the PTSD diagnosis in all nine participants. Phase two trials are currently underway.

Dr. Mike Kilgard said, "In a trial like this, some subjects usually do get better, but rarely do they lose their PTSD diagnosis. Typically, the majority will have this diagnosis for the rest of their lives. In this case, we had 100% loss of diagnosis. It’s very promising.”

You can learn more at:
https://neurosciencenews.com/vagus-nerve-stimulation-ptsd-28818/

https://news.utdallas.edu/health-medicine/study-ptsd-vagus-nerve-stimulation-2025/

Photo L to R: Michael Kilgard, PhD, Jane Wigginton, MD, Seth Hays, PhD, Rob Rennaker, PhD.

🎉 Huge congratulations to Assistant Professor Dr. Crystal Engineer for securing a newly approved grant from the International Rett Syndrome Foundation! 🎉

She leads the project “Novel Neuromodulation Therapy to Address Sensory Hypersensitivity in Rett Syndrome”, alongside co-investigators Dr. Seth Hays and Dr. Christa McIntyre.

Exciting research ahead—stay tuned! 🔬✨

This week's introduction to neuroscience question is all about cell functionality? Did you get the right answer? Let us know in the comments!

This week's intro to neuroscience question is about the physiology of cranial nerves.

Intro to Neuroscience Trivia time!

In this week's post, we ask about neurotransmitters at the neuromuscular junction. This is important to know to understand a variety of disease states related to the muscular system, and knowing about neurotransmitter activity in general makes drug discovery more relevant to biomedicine.Did you get the right answer? Let us know here in the comments!

🥳 Very happy to congratulate Erin Beth Lauraine for being awarded an Undergraduate Research Scholar Award from the Office of Undergraduate Education. 🔬 We look forward to seeing your final poster!

🔬✨ New Course Alert! ✨🔬

We’re thrilled to introduce "Computational and Genomic Approaches for Neuroscience" — a cutting-edge undergraduate course designed to bridge the gap between biology and technology.

📅 Enroll now! Let’s decode the brain together.

Today we highlight first year PhD student Rachel Arnold. Rachel was recently selected for the AAAS CASE workshop in DC where she learned about science policy, public and community communication and outreach. Thanks to the for funding this endeavor!