People

​Clarissa is responsible for MSTP programming, student advising and non-financial operations.

Program: Neurosciences

Graduation Year: 2004

Thesis Advisor: Ross L. Cagan

Thesis Title: "A Drosophila p38 ortholog is required for normal innate immunity and environmental stress responses"

Program: Molecular Genetics and Genomics

Current advisor: Brian Clark, PhD

Undergraduate university: University of Texas-Austin, 2016

Program: Evolutionary and Population Biology

Graduation Year: 1993

Thesis Advisor: Alan R. Templeton

Thesis Title: Molecular Systematics and Speciation in the Crayfish Subgenus Procericambarus (Decapoda: Cambaridae) Short title: Evolutionary Biology of Crayfishes

Program: Computational and Systems Biology

Current advisor: Jeffrey I. Gordon, MD

Undergraduate university: Macalester College, 2020

Program: Neurosciences

Graduation Year: 2012

Thesis Advisor: Steven J. Mennerick

Thesis Title: Mechanisms mediating adaptive presynaptic muting induction

Program: Genetics

Graduation Year: 1998

Thesis Advisor: Daniel E. Goldberg

Thesis Title: Investigations on the Regulation and Function of Hemoglobins in Microorganisms

Program: Molecular Cell Biology

Graduation Year: 2020

Thesis Advisor: Christopher M. Sturgeon

Thesis Title: The role of CDX4 during patterning of definitive hemogenic mesoderm

Program: Evolutionary Biology and Ecology

Graduation Year: 1986

Thesis Advisor: Alan R. Templeton

Thesis Title: "Mitochonrial DNA Variation in Populations of Daphnia Pulex Leydig Reproducing by Obligate and Cyclic Parthenogenesis"

Program affiliation
Neurosciences

Research summary
Leveraging synaptic physiology to treat addiction and affective symptoms of pain

Key words
electrophysiology, deep brain stimulation, dopamine, basal ganglia, reward and aversion, addiction, genetics, pharmacology, optogenetics, pain