PROGRAM FACULTY

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