STEM Speaker Series: Engineering Protein Synthesis Modulators to Understand the Neural Basis of Emotional Behaviors

Posted on September 24, 2024 by Clara Tran

Date: 09/24/2024

Time: 1:00 pm - 2:00 pm

Location
Special Collections Seminar Room

Description

In this presentation, Dr. Prerana Shrestha, Assistant Professor in the Department of Neurobiology & Behavior at the Renaissance School of Medicine, will discuss her team’s ongoing work on elucidating the molecular players underlying consolidation of emotional memories and how disruption of protein synthesis regulatory pathways can lead to pathological anxiety in neurodevelopmental disorders.

Emotions are crucial features that allow us to react adaptively to internal and external stimuli in a manner conducive towards self-preservation. Emotional regulation, the ability to recognize, evaluate, and control one’s emotions and recognize others’ emotions, strongly influences learning abilities, and other daily activities. Emotionally salient experiences are rapidly transformed into long-term memories, and they serve as useful model to study the biological basis of memory consolidation, the process of stabilizing a memory trace. In this presentation, Dr. Shrestha will discuss how nascent protein synthesis and regulatory pathways for protein synthesis modulate innate and learned emotional behaviors. Her lab has developed advanced genetic tools to control protein synthesis in specific neuronal populations with various degrees of temporal precision.

The SBU Libraries STEM Speaker Series is coordinated by Associate Librarian Clara Tran, Head of Science and Engineering.

For registration and information, please visit SB Engaged.

Please Note: Attendance for this event will be limited to 50 seats on a first come, first served basis. Please arrive on time for the event to ensure your seat.