News & Announcements

Past news and announcements are shown below. Current news is shown on our homepage.

Faculty member receives Chancellor's Medal

Jeff Blaustein, Director of the NSB Program presented a Distinguished University Faculty Lecture, entitled "Stress, Puberty, and Mental Health: Remodeling of the Brain’s Response to Hormones," on April 7, 2012.  He received the Chancellor's Medal from Chancellor Robert Holub.

Katherine V. Fite Distinguished Alumn Speaker

I am happy to announce the establishment of the annual Neuroscience and Behavior Program Katherine V. Fite Distinguished  Alumn Speaker to honor Kay’s tireless leadership in creation of our Neuroscience and Behavior Program.  Although there were a number of other individuals involved in its inception, it is fair to say that Kay was the pivotal person, who brought the Program to fruition.  Kay is now retired, but she has always been an indefatigable champion of interdepartmental graduate programs at UMass.  With this speaker, we want to honor Kay and showcase some of our alumns.   Although starting in 2013, we hope to hold the banquet along with the annual recruiting event, in this transitional year, the banquet will be held on Wednesday, April 18, 2012. 

I am also pleased to announce that our first speaker will be Kay’s final doctoral student, Skirmantas Janusonis, Assistant Professor at the University of California, Santa Barbara.

Hava Siegelmann elected to office

Hava Siegelmann was elected a governor of the International Neural Network Society

NSB alumn receives award

Eliza L. Nelson, an alumn of the NSB Program received the Hennessey-Smotherman Best Student Paper Award at the 44th annual meeting of the International Society for Developmental Psychobiology in Washington, D.C. in November 2011. Publication:  Nelson, E.L., Emery, M.S., Babcock, S.M., Novak, M.F., Suomi, S.J., & Novak, M.A. (2011). Head orientation and handedness trajectory in rhesus macaques (Macaca mulatta). Developmental Psychobiology. 53: 246-255.  The Hennessy-Smotherman Best Student Paper Award is made for the best paper by a student published in Developmental Psychobiology over a one year period. The goals of the award are:  (1) to promote the highest quality of student research in the field of developmental psychobiology, and (2) to encourage students in the field to submit their best work to Developmental Psychobiology. 

Linda Witt to retire

Congratulations and best of luck to Linda Witt on her retirement in January 2012, after 30 years of dedicated service to the University, the last 25 of which have been as Program Manager of the Neuroscience and Behavior Program.

Sandra Petersen receives Distinguished Outreach Research Award

Sandra Petersen, a faculty member in the NSB Program, received the College Distinguished Outreach Research Award.

Jason Breves receives Best Postdoctoral Poster Award

Jason Breves, a postdoc in the lab of Rolf Karlstrom and an associate member of the NSB Program received the Best Postdoctoral Poster Award from the North American Society for Comparative Endocrinology.

Lisa Scott receives Early CAREER Development Award

Lisa Scott, a faculty member in the NSB Program received a prestigious Early CAREER Development Award from the National Science Foundation.

NSB represented at US-Latin American Neuroendocrine Workshop

Nafissa Ismail, postdoc and Associate Member of the NSB Program won a Young Investigator Travel Award, and Jeffrey Blaustein, Director of the NSB Program gave the keynote address at the US-Latin American Neuroendocrine Workshop in Vina del Mar, Chile in August, 2012

Graduate Students in the News

Lauri Kurdziel, a graduate student in the NSB Program, won the Best Poster Award at the annual Life Sciences Graduate Research Symposium on November 16, 2012.  Lauri presented a poster on, "Emotional memory consolidation over mid-day sleep in early development."

John Hernandez, a first year graduate student in the Neuroscience and Behavior Program was named a USDA Fellow by the American Association of Hispanics in Higher Education (AAHHE), based on his Master's thesis at University of Texas at San Antonio.  His thesis, which earned him the designation of finalist in the competition for outstanding thesis in food and agricultural sciences is entitled, "Long-term sensitization alters the biophysical properties of a decision-making neuron in the feeding neural circuit of Aplysia Californica."   John will receive an all-expenses-paid trip to attend the Career Preparation Institute (CPI) to be held in conjunction with the AAHHE in San Antonio, Texas March 26-30, 2013.

Emily Manoogian, a graduate student in the NSB Program, recently received a Love of Learning Award worth $500 from The Honor Society of Phi Kappa Phi—the nation’s oldest and most selective collegiate honor society for all academic disciplines. She is one of 140 recipients nationwide to receive the award, which helps fund post-baccalaureate studies and career development.  Emily was initiated into the Society in 2011 at University of Massachusetts Amherst. Emily plans to use the award to travel to work with her collaborators at University of Pennsylvania to learn new genetic techniques.  Congratulations to Emily!

Emily Manoogian and Akshata Sonni were inducted into the UMass chapter of the Phi Kappa Phi Honor Society.

Amarylis Velez-Perez was recently awarded a three year Graduate Research Fellowship from the National Science Foundation.

Lauri Kurdziel and Akshata Sonni, graduate students in the Neuroscience and Behavior Program working in the Rebecca Spencer laboratory were each awarded Trainee Awards from the Sleep Research Society.  They will receive funds towards the conference travel and registration, and also were accepted to participate in the Trainee Symposia.  Akshata also received a Fellowship for the Summer Institute in Cognitive Neuroscience – a 2-week short course in Santa Barbara this summer.  

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