PROGRAM FACULTY
E. Paul Torrance Professor; Director, Torrance Center for Creativity & Talent Development
Research Interests: Creativity and the human imagination, mental time travel, mental state reasoning, self-referential cognition, social cognition, consciousness, aesthetic engagement
Deborah Barany
Assistant Professor, Kinesiology and AU/UGA Medical Partnership
Research Interests: Neural mechanisms of goal-directed movement, functional neuroimaging, non-invasive brain stimulation, neurorehabilitation
Michael Bartlett
Georgia Athletic Association Professor, Pharmaceutical and Biomedical Sciences
Research Interests: ADME of drugs and environmental toxicants, impact of compounds on memory, cognition, and neuropathic pain; oligonucleotide therapeutics and biomarkers
Steven Beach
Distinguished Research Professor, Psychology; Co-Director, Center for Family Research
Research Interests: Epigenetics, marital and family processes, marital discord, depression and anxiety in close relationships, self-processes in relationships
Mark Brown
Professor, Entomology
Research Interests: Neuro-endocrinology of development, reproduction, and metabolism in insects; evolution of peptide hormone structure and function
Haini N Cai
Assistant Professor, Cellular Biology
Research Interests: Nuclear and genome organization, chromatin structure and function, gene regulation in Drosophila development
Jarrod Call
Assistant Professor, Kinesiology (Exercise Science Programs)
Research Interests: Skeletal muscle physiology, mitochondrial physiology, regenerative medicine, muscle electrophysiology
Paige Carmichael
Professor, Pathology
Research Interests: Inherited diseases, general pathology, ophthalmic pathology, digestive pathology, integumentary pathology
Brett Clementz
Professor, Psychology; Director of the Bio-Imaging Research Center (BIRC)
Research Interests: Structural, functional & genetic abnormalities in schizophrenia
Brian Condie
Associate Professor, Genetics
Research Interests: Genetic analysis of mouse pharyngeal development and the development of new tools for chromosome engineering
Brian Cummings
Professor, Pharmaceutical and Biomedical Sciences; Professor and Director, Interdisciplinary Toxicology Program
Research Interests: Molecular toxicology, cell signaling, prostate cancer, anti-cancer, kidney
Krzysztof Czaja
Associate Professor, Veterinary Biosciences & Diagnostic Imaging
Research Interests: See website
Julie Coffield
Associate Professor, Toxicology
Research Interests: Toxicology, neurotoxicology, cellular mechanisms of Botulinum neurotoxins
Harry Dailey
Emeritus; former Director of Biomedical and Health Sciences Institute
Research Interests: Disease mechanisms, medical biochemistry, infectious disease enzymology, metoalloenzyme chemistry, structural biology, physical biochemistry
Steve Dalton
Professor, Cellular Biology; GRA Eminent Scholar of Molecular Cell Biology
Research Interests: Stem cell biology, development of cell therapies for type 1 diabetes and cardiovascular disease, pluripotent stem cells in early development and induced pluripotent stem cells, cell reprogramming
Claire de La Serre
Assistant Professor, Foods and Nutrition
Research Interests: Pathways by which diet composition affects energy balance, influence of energy-dense diets on gut microbiota composition, gastrointestinal (GI) functions and inflammation, how changes in microbiota composition can affect gut-brain signaling to promote overeating
Rodney K. Dishman
Professor, Kinesiology
Research Interests: see website
Gaylen L. Edwards
Department Head, Physiology & Pharmacology; Georgia Athletic Association Professorship in Veterinary Medicine
Research Interests: Neural processing of abdominal sensory information, control of ingestive behavior and autonomic function
Jonathan Eggenschwiler
Associate Professor, Genetics
Research Interests: Mechanisms controlling tissue patterning during mammalian embryonic development
Adviye Ergul
Regents’ Professor, Physiology; Co-Director Physiology Graduate Program
Augusta University
Research Interests: see website
Susan Fagan
Distinguished Research Professor, Clinical and Administrative Pharmacy; Assistant Dean, Augusta University Program
Research Interests: Stroke, experimental therapeutics, angiotensin modulation, recovery, angiogenesis, vascular protection
Nikolay (Nick) M. Filipov
Professor, Physiology and Pharmacology
Research Interests: Neurotoxicology, neuroimmunology, communication of the nervous and immune systems in health and disease, basal ganglia disorders
Dorothy Munkenbeck Fragaszy
Professor, Psychology; Director of the Primate Behavior Laboratory
Research Interests: Flexible instrumental behavior (problem-solving), perception, manipulation, and skill learning in primates (capuchin monkeys), the developmental bases of flexible behavior, and the contribution of social learning and social context to the expression of flexible behavior
James Franklin
Associate Professor, Pharmaceutical and Biomedical Sciences
Research Interests: Mechanisms underlying neuronal apoptosis with a focus on the basic cellular mechanism by which mitochondria contribute to this type of neuronal death, as well as the role of mitochondria in Alzheimer’s disease, drug discovery for treatment of filaria infections in humans, animals and plants
Zhen Fu
Professor, Veterinary Pathology; Veterinary Virologist
Research Interests: Neuropathogenesis of rabies, functional genomics and proteomics, development of anti-viral vaccines, monoclonal antibodies, and agents, regulation of rabies virus transcription and replication
Silvia Giraudo
Associate Professor, Foods and Nutrition
Research Interests: Childhood obesity intervention, nutrition
Adam Goodie
Professor, Neuroscience
Research Interests: Judgment and decision making, especially the role of control in decision making, Bayesian updating, and cognitive contributors to problem gambling.
Tai Guo
Professor, Veterinary Biosciences & Diagnostic Imaging
Research Interests: Toxicology of nanobiomaterials and endocrine disruptors, mechanisms of diabetes and asthma, probiotics, microbiome and immunotoxicology
Brian Haas
Associate Professor, Behavioral and Brain Sciences Program, Neuroscience Program
Research Interests: Individual differences in social and affective functioning in humans by using a multi-modal approach
Billy Hammond
Professor, Neuroscience
Research Interests: human visual system
Robert S. Haltiwanger
Professor; GRA Eminent Scholar in Biomedical Glycosciences
Biochemistry & Molecular Biology
Research Interests: Role of glycosylation in regulating Notch signaling, assisting protein folding, and development
Phil Holmes
Professor, Behavior and Brain Science Program (Psychology); Neuroscience Program Chair; Medical Partnership Faculty
Research Interests: Behavioral neuropharmacology, neuropeptides and trophic factors, plasticity, stress, depression, and addiction
Shelley Hooks
Associate Professor, Pharmaceutical and Biomedical Sciences
Research Interests: G-protein coupled receptors, molecular pharmacology, signal transduction, ovarian cancer, neural stem cells
Jayani Jayawardhana
Assistant Professor, College of Pharmacy
Research Interests: Health economics, health policy, pharmaceutical economics, industrial organization
Daichi Kamiyama
Assistant Professor, Cellular Biology
Research Interests: Identifying principles of neural circuit assembly
Lohitash Karumbaiah
Associate Professor of Regenerative Medicine, Regenerative Bioscience Center, Animal and Dairy Science
Research Interests: Defects in carbohydrate biosynthesis and alterations in carbohydrate composition, development of new carbohydrate-based biomaterials for spinal cord injuries, traumatic brain injuries, and neural interfacing applications
Marc Kent
Professor, Neurology & Neurosurgery
Research Interests: see website
Williams Kisaalita
Professor, Chemical, Materials, and Biomedical Engineering
Research Interests: Tissue engineering, cell-surface interactions, assays for high throughput screening (HTS), renewable energy utilization with emphasis on biogas-powered cooling, global service learning
Peter Kner
Associate Professor, Electrical and Computer Engineering
Research Interests: Improving imaging at the nanoscale in biomedicine and engineering; optics and biophotonics
James Lauderdale
Associate Professor, Cellular Biology; Graduate Coordinator, Neuroscience
Research Interests: Cells and disease, cells in development
Nicole Lazar
Professor, Statistics
Research Interests: Likelihood theory (with an emphasis on empirical likelihood), applications in social and behavioral science, model selection and interpretation, the history of statistics, analysis of functional neuroimaging data, the role of statistics in society
Rebecca Marshall
Associate Professor, Department of Communication Sciences and Special Education
Research Interests: Aphasia, attention, meditation, cognition, and integrative medicine
Jennifer McDowell
Professor & Chair, Behavior and Brain Science Program (Psychology); BioImaging Research Center
Research Interests: Schizophrenia, psychosis, cognitive control, plasticity, saccades, ocular motor system, exercise, f/MRI, DTI
Richard Meagher
Distinguished Research Professor, Genetics
Research Interests: Molecular genetics and evolution of Arabidopsis gene expression, engineering plants for phytoremediation of ionic- and methyl-mercury
L. Stephen Miller
Professor & Director of Bio-imaging Research Center, Neuroscience
Research Interests: Aspects of working memory, executive function,
and older adult cognition using structural and functional neuroimaging and neuropsychological tools
Jae-Kyung Lee
Assistant Professor, Physiology and Pharmacology
Research Interests: Determining key molecules and their intrinsic mechanisms in neuroinflammation and neurodegenerative diseases
Dexi Liu
Panoz Professor of Pharmacy, Pharmaceutical & Biomedical Sciences
Research Interests: Gene therapy, obesity, drug delivery, gene drug discovery
Hongxiang Liu
Assistant Professor, Animal & Dairy Science
Research Interests: See website
Tianming Liu
Distinguished Research Professor, Computer Science
Research Interests: Brain Imaging, computational neuroscience, cognitive computing, and deep neural learning
Puliyur S. MohanKumar
Professor, Veterinary Biosciences and Diagnostic Imaging
Research Interests: Neuroendocrinology reproductive aging, stress axis and metabolic function, neuroendocrine-immune interactions, prenatal programming and its neuroendocrine consequences, neuroendocrine effects of exposure to environmentally relevant chemicals
Sheba M.J. MohanKumar
Associate Professor, Veterinary Biosciences and Diagnostic Imaging
Research Interests: Neuroendocrine immune interactions in the context of reproduction and stress, prenatal stress and programming of obesity, environmental exposures and their impact on stress and reproduction, biomarker development for various human diseases
Luke Mortensen
Assistant Professor, Regenerative Medicine and Engineering
Research Interests: Multiphoton microscopy, cellular therapeutics, optical imaging, Mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs)
Emily Noble
Assistant Professor, Foods and Nutrition
Research Interests: Feeding behavior, physical activity, energy expenditure, mechanisms by which diet and exercise affect the brain and cognitive function
Patrick J. Oconnor
Professor, Department of Kinesiology
Research Interests: Feelings of energy and fatigue, pain, anxiety, cognition (executive function, sustained attention)
Assaf Oshri
Associate Professor, Human Development and Family Science
Research Interests: Children and youth well-being and resilience, understanding youth development using multi-method (observation, surveys, neuroimaging, stress physiology) and multi-level research (e.g., individual cognition, personality, family, peer, and neighborhood environments), mechanisms that underlie the link between early life stress in childhood (e.g., child maltreatment, poverty, cultural stress) and adolescent behavioral risk (e.g. substance use and sexual risk behaviors) and resilience
Ramana Pidaparti
Professor, Royal Aeronautical Society Fellow
Research Interests: design engineering and innovation, computational mechanics, drug delivery devices, STEM education
Simon Platt
Professor, Neurology and Neurosurgery
Research Interests: Ischemic disease of the CNS (canine stroke), canine brain tumors, epilepsy
Lisa M. Renzi-Hammond
Assistant Professor, Health Promotion & Behavior, Institute of Gerontology; Adjunct Assistant Professor, Department of Psychology
Research Interests: Aging, nutrition, cognitive function, brain health, sensory function, cognitive training, lifespan development
Rachel Roberts-Galbraith
Assistant Professor, Cellular Biology
Research Interests: Regeneration using planarians as a model, central nervous system, regeneration of neurons
Dean Sabatinelli
Associate Professor, Behavioral and Brain Sciences Program, Neuroscience
Research Interests: Emotional stimulus processing, emotional perception and imagery, functional magnetic resonance imaging, dense-array electroencephalography, peripheral psychophysiological recording
Jesse Schank
Assistant Professor, Physiology and Pharmacology
Research Interests: Drug and alcohol abuse, stress and anxiety, neuropeptides, neuropharmacology
Walter Schmidt
Professor, Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, Integrated Life Sciences Graduate Coordinator
Research Interests: Post-translational modifications in regards to the function of CaaX-type proteins, enzymology/metalloenzyme chemistry, cancer/signal transduction
Ping Shen
Professor, Cellular Biology
Research Interests: Cells and disease, cell development, cell structure and function
Tarkeshwar Singh
Assistant Professor, Kinesiology
Research Interests: Sensorimotor control, biomechanics, eye-tracking, robotics, electrophysiology, computational modeling
Heather Steet
Associate Research Scientist, Biochemistry and Molecular Biology
Research Interests: Development/ stem cell biology, disease mechanisms/medical biochemistry/infectious disease, enzymology/metalloenzyme chemistry, glycobiology
Steven Stice
Professor, Eminent Scholar, Director of the Regenerative Bioscience Ctr. (RBC)
Research Interests: Exosome-based regenerative therapies for the treatment of CNS and neurodegenerative disorders, namely Stroke and TBI
Gregory Strauss
Assistant Professor, Psychology
Research Interests: Schizophrenia, psychosis risk, anhedonia, reward, emotion, social cognition
Lawrence Sweet
Gary R. Sperduto Professor, Clinical Psychology
Research Interests: Brain-behavior relationships, neuroimaging data analysis, neuropsychological assessment
Michael Tiemeyer
Professor, Biochemistry & Molecular Biology; Associate Director of the Complex Carbohydrate Research Center
Research Interests: Development/stem cell biology, glycobiology
John Wagner
Professor, Physiology and Pharmacology
Research Interests: Neurophysiology of the hippocampus, cellular mechanisms of learning & memory, neuropharmacology of drugs of abuse
Franklin D. West
Associate Professor, Regenerative Bioscience Center, Animal & Dairy Science
Research Interests: Regenerative therapies to treat stroke and TBI, development of induced pluripotent stem cell derived neural stem cells (iNSCs) and extracellular vesicles as novel multimodal neuroprotective and regenerative therapeutics
Kojo Mensa Wilmot
Professor, Department Head, Cellular Biology
Research Interests: Cells in infection and immunity, cell structure and function
Adrian Wolstenholme
Professor, Infectious Diseases
Research Interests: Molecular helminthology, molecular basis of drug resistance
Jing Xu
Associate Professor, Cognition and Dexterity (CoDex) Lab
Research Interests: Understanding how humans learn complex motor skills, how skills are maintained across age, how to restore them after neuromuscular injuries; identifying behavioral, cognitive, and neural components essential for hand dexterous function; deriving learning and control principles that support the acquisition and production of dexterous movement; exploring factors that influence rehabilitation; long-term goal is designing effective therapies to help patients regain their motor skills
Yao Yao
Assistant Professor, Animal & Dairy Science
Research Interests: In vivo delivery shuttle for genome engineering in biomedicine and agriculture; gene regulation, neuromuscular dystrophy, neurodegenerative disease, gene therapy and drug target screen
Yao Yao
Assistant Professor, Pharmaceutical and Biomedical Sciences
Research Interests: Using conditional knockout technique to study the functions of laminin in blood-brain barrier (BBB) integrity under both physiological and pathological conditions (using stroke and Alzheimer’s disease as disease models), generating novel tools to manipulate BBB permeability to aid CNS drug delivery, developing innovative therapies for stroke and Alzheimer’s disease
Nadja Zeltner
Assistant Professor, Member of the Center for Molecular Medicine
Research Interests: Utilizing stem cells, hPSCs, to generate cell types affected in disorders of the peripheral nervous system
Qun Zhao
Associate Professor, Physics
Research Interests: Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) physics, both experimental and computational, MR applications in biomedicine