Alumni – Recent Graduates and their Professional Positions
Jamie Raudensky Doyle, Ph.D – 2008 “Neurochemical and Physiological Effects of Chronic Stress on Methamphetamine Toxicity”
Postdoctoral Fellow, Department of Psychiatry – Harvard Medical School, Laboratory of Molecular and Developmental Neurobiology – McLean Hospital
Sonia Podvin, Ph.D. – 2008 “Characterization of the Anti-Aging Protein Klotho in Normal Brain Aging and Neurodegeneration”
Postdoctoral Fellow at UCSD with Dr. Andrew Baird in the department of surgery.
Dan Roberts, M.D., Ph.D. – 2008 “Regulation of Type A GABA Rector Alph-4 Subunit and the N-Methyl-D Aspartate Receptor Subunit 1 by Brain-Derived Neurotrophic Factor”
Dan is an Otolaryngology (ENT) resident in the Harvard Combined Program in Otolarnygology. He hopes that his future research will investigate the basic mechanisms of hearing loss and improve cochlear implantation technology.
Ausaf Bari, M.D., Ph.D. – 2008 “The Role of the Nucleus Accumbens, Dopamine, and Glutamate Receptors in Cocaine Reward”
Neurosurgery Resident at UCLA Medical Center.
Price Blair, Ph.D. – 2008 “Stimulation of Toll-like Receptor 2 in Human Platelets Induces a Thrombo-Inflammatory Response”
Research Fellow in Center for Hemostasis and Thrombosis Research under the direction of Barbara Furie, Ph.D., and Bruce Furie, M.D., at Beth Israel Deaconess/Harvard Medical School.
David Eyerman, Ph.D. – 2007 “The Role of the Vesicular Monoamine Transporter 2 and Nicotinic Acetylcholine Receptors in Methamphetamine Toxicity to the Rat Striatum”
Dave is working for Alkermes of Cambridge, MA as a Scientist III Neuropharmacologist in the Life Sciences Department. In this role he is the Principal Investigator of a microdialysis and neurochemistry program supporting drug discovery efforts for multiple disease areas. In addition, he sits on a leadership committee for psychiatric disease target areas.
Karla Mark, Ph.D. – 2007 “Methamphetamine Neurotoxicity and the Polysynaptic Activation of Glutamatergic Neurons in the Basal Ganglia”
Postdoctoral Research Fellow at Buck Institute for Age Research.
Heath Schmidt, Ph.D. – 2007 “The Limbic Circuitry Underlying the Reinstatement of Cocaine-Seeking Behavior in Rats “
Research Associate, Psychiatry, University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine
Joseph Breier, Ph.D. – 2006“The Role of L-Tyrosine in the Neurotoxicity of (+) 3,4- Methylenedioxymethamphetamine (MDMA) in the Rate and in a Serotonin Cell Line”
Postdoctoral Fellow, Neurotoxicology Division, US EPA
Kelley Burridge, Ph.D. – 2006 (Biomedical Engineering) “Targeted Drug Delivery: Effects of Grafted Polyethylene Glycol on Ligand-Receptor Binding Under Flow”
Research Associate, Biomedical Engineering, Duke University
Lori Fitz, Ph.D. – 2005 “Activation-Induced Changes in the Histamine Content of Murine Mast Cells and their Adhesion to NIH-3T3 Fibroblasts”
Lori’s research focus is to develop and utilize biophysical, enzyme, and protein interaction assays to help evaluate potential drug candidates and identify new drug targets for clinical indications in autoimmunity, rheumatoid arthritis, asthma and COPD.
Jeffrey Simard, Ph.D. – 2005 “Fatty Acid Transport: Binding to Human Serum Albumin and Trafficking in Model and Biological Membranes”
After getting his PhD in Pharmacology in 2005, he moved to Germany and has worked at the Chemical Genomics Centre of the Max Planck Society in Dortmund, Germany. He recently filed two patents on a new binding assay for kinases which he developed to specifically identify and screen for allosteric inhbitors. They are using this to identify new chemical scaffolds for inhibiting kinases involved in the onset of cancer. In September 2009, he will lead a new project in conjunction with 3 pharmaceutical companies in Germany that will use this assay for new target proteins of interest.
