Drs. Abraham Palmer and Jonathon Sebat spoke at Stone Brewing on April 26th about how genes influence our everyday lives. Dr. Palmer spoke about his work with 23andMe in a talk titled, “Genetics of delay discounting: why do some people want a small reward now while others choose to wait for a bigger one later?” This was part of the Taste of Science event series hosted by Scientists, Inc.
Dr. Abraham Palmer gave a talk at the Experimental Biology meeting in San Diego on April 22. His talk was titled, “Learning and old dog’s new tricks: the role of Glyoxalase 1 in regulating behavior and GABAergic signaling and how we stumbled across it.”
A new U01 grant from the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA) was awarded to Dr. Tom Jhou and Dr. Abraham Palmer. The grant, titled “Genomic Analysis of Avoidance Learning in Addiction,” will start on April 15, 2018 and will end January 31, 2023.
Dr. Amanda Barkley-Levenson gave an oral presentation at the 13th Annual Lewis L. Judd Young Investigators Symposium at UCSD on Monday, April 16th. Her talk was entitled, “Evaluating Glyoxalase 1 as a Novel Therapeutic Target for Excessive Ethanol Consumption and Comorbid Disorders.”
The symposium is held by the UCSD Department of Psychiatry and is named after Lewis L. Judd, M.D. who served as the second Chair of the UC San Diego Department of Psychiatry from 1977-2014.
Dr. Abraham Palmer gave a plenary talk for The Society for Neuroscience, Oregon and Southwest Washington Chapter Meeting, in Portland, Oregon on Friday, April 13th. His talk was titled, “The surprising role of the enzyme Glyoxalase 1 and its substrate methylglyoxal in anxiety, depression and alcohol consumption.”
Drs. Abraham Palmer and Amelie Baud presented their research on psychiatric genetics to approximately 40 high school students on Friday April 6th at UCSD. Many of the students are taking AP Psychology or AP Economics courses. They were visiting the UCSD campus from Sweetwater High School in National City, CA.
Dr. Abraham Palmer was the keynote speaker at the Waggoner Center for Alcohol & Addiction Research at the University of Texas at Austin on Friday, March 23rd, 2018. His talk was titled “Behavioral genetic studies of alcoholism and alcohol related traits using mice, rats, and humans.”
The article, “Glyoxalase (GLO1) inhibition or genetic overexpression does not alter ethanol’s locomotor effects: implications for GLO1 as a therapeutic target in alcohol use disorders,” was written by Amanda Barkley-Levenson and accepted for publication in Alcoholism: Clinical and Experimental Research. Dr. Abraham Palmer is a co-author on the paper.
Congratulations, Amanda!
A new U01 grant from the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA) was awarded to Olivier George from TSRI. Dr. Palmer is a co-investigator on this project, which will use HS rats to perform a GWAS for extended access to oxycodone. The grant (U01DA044451-01A1) titled “Use of Next-Gen Sequencing to Identify Genetic Variants that Influence Compulsive Oxycodone Intake in Outbred Rats” will start on April 1, 2018 and will end January 31, 2023.
The article, “Inhibition of Glyoxalase 1 reduces alcohol self-administration in dependent and nondependent rats,” is in press and will be published in Pharmacology, Biochemistry, and Behavior. Dr. Abraham Palmer & Dr. Amanda Barkley-Levenson are co-authors and other authors include Giordano de Guglielmo, Dana Conlisk, and Olivier George.
