News

Anasuya Das, a former student in Dr. Krystel Huxlin's lab who defended her PhD thesis on July 18, 2013 was awarded the Doty Award for Excellence in Neuroscience Dissertation Research during 2013 Neuroscience Retreat.

Christina Cloninger, a 4^th-year student in Dr. Gary Paige's lab, won second place in the John Bartlett Poster Session during 2013 Neuroscience Retreat, Rochester, NY.

Ryan Dawes, a third-year student in Dr. Ed Brown's lab, won a travel award from the Schmitt Program on Integrative Brain Research. Ryan plans to use this award to attend the American Association for Cancer Research (AACR) Advances in Breast Cancer Research Conference, which is being held in San Diego from October 3^rd-6^th, 2013.

Kelley S. Madden, Ph.D., Research Assistant Professor in Edward Brown's lab, in the Department of Biomedical Engineering has received a 2-year DOD IDEA Expansion Grant worth $575,000 for her project entitled, Alpha2-Adrenergic Receptors and Breast Tumor Stroma: A Novel Pathway Driving Breast Cancer Growth and Metastasis. The project is based on the stress neurotransmitter norepinephrine which promotes breast tumor progression and metastasis. The grant will investigate how selective activation of one of the receptors for norepinephrine, the alpha2-adrenergic receptor, impacts tumor stromal cells and their modulation of the tumor extracellular matrix to promote tumor metastasis. The proposed research may lead to new therapies to treat metastatic breast cancer by targeting alpha2-adrenergic receptors.

Neuroscience Graduate Program student, Ryan Dawes, has been awarded a 2013 Breast Cancer Research Grant, from the Breast Cancer Coalition of Rochester. The 1-year, $50,000 grant will fund his project, entitled Breast Cancer Exosomes, Novel Intermediaries in Psychosocial Stress-induced Tumor Pathogenesis and was only one of two applications to be awarded this prestigious grant. This work will investigate if psychosocial stress can modulate the number or content of secreted small vesicles (exosomes), and determine if this can alter the process of tumorigenesis in an animal model of spontaneous breast cancer as Ryan continues his research in Dr. Edward Brown's lab.