Monica presented her thesis titled “Sex Specific Social Modulation of the Neuroinflammatory Response to Glocal cerebral Ischemia” on Thursday, March 16th.

Monica graduated from the University of Puerto Rico at Mayaguez in 2012. Interested in pursuing an academic career she moved to Columbus Ohio to participate in the Discovery Post-Baccalaureate Research Education Program, and begun working in Courtney DeVries’ laboratory. For graduate school Monica decided to join the Neuroscience Graduate Program at The Ohio State University to continue her ongoing research projects investigating the effects of an omega-3 enriched diet on chemotherapy induced-inflammation and the social influences on the neuroinflammatory response to cerebral ischemia. Throughout her time in graduate school, Monica has presented work from both projects in national conferences and has co-authored six peer-review articles. She will also be submitting two first-author manuscripts on her thesis project. Following graduation, Monica will continue investigating social influences on health at The University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill.

Come support NGSO at our first ever fundraiser to be held this Thursday, March 16th at MELT (High St. location).

Go anytime that day (they are open 11am- 10pm) with this flyer and 20% of your order goes to our organization to help fund future events.

It’s also the first day of March Madness so stop by to watch the games and chow down on some delicious food!

Dan presented his dissertation defense titled “Neuroimmune and Hematopoietic Regulation of Stress-Induced Anxiety” on Friday, March 10th.

Dan graduated summa cum laude from William Paterson University of NJ in 2011 with a Bachelor’s degree in psychology, a minor in biology, distinguished honors in biopsychology, and three additional graduating honors. In 2012 he joined the labs of Dr. Jonathan Godbout and Dr. John Sheridan to study neuroimmune and hematopoietic regulation of behavioral response to stress. While in graduate school, Dan authored a total of 11 papers, with primary author papers in The Journal of Neuroscience, Biological Psychiatry, Frontiers of Neuroscience, Molecular Psychiatry (in press) and is preparing another first author paper for submission. In addition he received numerous honors and awards, including a University Fellowship, T32 Fellowship, F31NRSA Fellowship, finalist in the Hayes Graduate Forum (2014, 2015, 2016), OSUMC Trainee Research Day plenary speaker, IGP student plenary speaker (2016), Dept. of Neuroscience trainee research award (2016), and travel awards from: IGP (2015 & 2016), OSUMC (2015), College of Dentistry (2015), & PNIRS (2014 & 2015). Dan was also the Student Seminar chair in the academic year 2014-2015. He has presented his doctoral work at numerous annual national and international conferences, including oral presentations at SFN (2014 & 2015), PNIRS (2014 & 2015), as well as poster presentations at SFN (2013) and EMDS (2015). Following graduation, Dan will continue on as a post-doc in the lab of Dr. Jonathan Godbout to study the neuroimmunology of aging.

Zoe presented her dissertation titled “The Role of NG2+ Cells in Endogenous Repair after Spinal Cord Injury”.

Zoe graduated from Miami University in 2012 with Bachelor’s degrees in Zoology and French, a minor in Neuroscience, and University Honors with Distinction & French Departmental Honors. While in undergraduate, Zoe worked in the lab of Dr. Lori Isaacson researching sympathetic regeneration of the brain vasculature following peripheral nerve injury. She joined Dr. Dana McTigue’s lab at The Ohio State University in 2012 to study the role of NG2+ progenitor cells in acute and chronic spinal cord injury models. While at OSU Zoe received the Extended Dean’s Distinguished University Fellowship (4 years of graduate funding), a Career Development Grant, and the 2015 Department of Neuroscience Trainee Research Award. She also received a 3-year F31 Ruth L. Kirschstein National Research Service Award (NRSA) Fellowship from the NIH. While in graduate school, Zoe authored 3 first author papers, including two in the Journal of Neuroscience and one in the Journal of Undergraduate Neuroscience Education, co-authored one review, and is preparing another first-author paper for submission. In addition to her research, Zoe has interned for the past year as a Research Analyst for the Neurotechnology Innovations Translator helping to develop novel medical devices for neurological disorders. Additionally, she has served as a national officer for the past 6 years for Nu Rho Psi, the National Honor Society for Neuroscience, and was recently elected as President-Elect for the society.