Two neuroscience faculty win 2018 Distinguished Professor Awards
Two members of the Neuroscience PhD program faculty received the title 2018 Distinguished Research Professor on April 16 last week to commemorate their accomplishments in celebration of UGA Honors Week.
Brett Clementz, one of the five recipients of the award, is a professor in the psychology department who has rapidly advanced the understanding of the biological bases of psychoses with the use of brain scan technologies, sophisticated data analysis and batteries of patient tests.
His original goal involved learning how inaccurate sensory processing leads to abnormalities in brain functioning and behavior; however, his laboratory would come to identify biomarkers of neurobiological deviations that are associated with manifestations of different subgroups of psychoses.
Using the tools of modern neuroscience, he helped spearhead a significant movement to re-envision diagnoses of psychoses. His work regarding alterations in brain oscillation patterns have helped show how integrated brain activity supports higher level cognition, emotion processing, and other aspects of behavior.
Michael Tiemeyer is a professor and associate director of the Carbohydrate Research Center. He has catalyzed advancements areas such as neural development, neural dysfunction, neurodegeneration, respiratory inflammatory diseases and analytic carbohydrate chemistry.
His research addresses the biological function of cell surface carbohydrates (glycans) in mediating cellular interactions that underlie normal development and human disease progression. His studies in Drosphila have made use of model systems to make groundbreaking discoveries related to the roles of glycans in neural development.
Tiemeyer’s contributions to glycan analysis and glycomic toolmaking have greatly improved understanding of glycan functions in cellular differentiation, tissue development and inflammatory disease progression.
Read more about the 2018 Distinguished Research Professors on UGA Today.