Dr. Nixon is Professor of Psychiatry and Psychology, Chief of Addiction Research, Director of the Biobehavioral Core of the University of Florida Clinical and Translational Science Institute, and Director of the Neurocognitive Laboratory in the UF Department of Psychiatry. She is an experienced clinical researcher in the area of substance abuse and dependence.

Because of the complex nature of substance abuse, her work uses comprehensive behavioral assessments including neuropsychological testing, brain electrophysiology (electroencephalography and event-related potentials), and clinical research interviews. This work has provided many opportunities for Dr. Nixon to provide training to graduate students and post-doctoral associates.

In addition to neurobehavioral research, Dr. Nixon has sustained a strong interest in community outreach and education. During her tenure in Oklahoma, she was instrumental in the development and implementation of the Oscar A. Parsons Summer Institute which engaged experts from across the country in the provision of education and training programs for community service providers and she was a key component (with Dr. Deborah Jones-Saumty) in the American Indian Research Group of Oklahoma which fostered substance-related research initiatives among the non-reservation residing tribes in the state. Following the Oklahoma City Bombing (1995), she diverted a portion of her efforts to another concern; the psychiatric impact of the tragedy on the community and emergency responders. Her continued commitment to community outreach is reflected in her on-going work focusing on the cognitive, psychological and social concomitants of substance use and her participation in a variety of workshops, seminars, committees and councils.

Dr. Nixon has authored over 110 peer-reviewed articles and book chapters as well as edited two books. She has made over 200 scientific presentations and held grants and awards from a variety of private, state and national sources including the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism (NIAAA), the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA), the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA), and more. She is completing her tenure as the Immediate Past President of the Research Society on Alcoholism. Within the American Psychological Association, Dr. Nixon is a Fellow in both Divisions 28 (Substance Use and Psychopharmacology) and 50 (Addiction) of the American Psychological Association. She served as the Member-at-large for Division 50 from 2006-2009.

The Peris lab is currently studying the neurochemical mechanisms of ethanol addiction. As part of this research, we measure how dopaminergic and amino acid neurotransmission in brain reward circuitry (e.g., nucleus accumbens, ventral tegmental area) is altered in rodents exhibiting high degrees of ethanol self-administration. We have developed the “jello shot” method of ethanol self-administration with Dr. Neil Rowland of the Department of Psychology. This model results in pharmacologically relevant levels of ethanol intake in non-genetically-selected rodents, but also controls for non-ethanol reward, caloric consumption and comparable levels of operant responding by the use of non-ethanol gelatin as a control reinforcer. Utilizing a combination of behavioral and microdialysis techniques, we have demonstrated that previous binge ethanol exposures selectively increase ethanol intake, ethanol reward and glutamate levels in nucleus accumbens while not affecting plain gel intake or neurotransmission during plain gel reward. Another novel finding indicates the importance of elevations in glycine in the nucleus accumbens during anticipation of reward.

Our most recent work, in collaboration with Dr. Eric G. Krause in our department, has focused on the role of oxytocin in the regulation of reward circuitry and its impact on ethanol intake. We have found that oxytocin receptors are expressed by both dopamine and glutamate neurons in the ventral tegmental area which might mediate oxytocin inhibition of ethanol intake. We are currently developing optogenetic techniques to address how selective activation of neurons in reward centers that express oxytocin receptors is altered by excessive ethanol intake.

Barry Setlow received his PhD in 1998 from the University of California, Irvine, where he worked with Jim McGaugh on amygdala-striatal systems involved in consolidation of different forms of learning and memory. He went on to post-doctoral training with Michela Gallagher at Johns Hopkins University, where he continued work on the role of amygdala-striatal systems in different forms of learning, using both behavioral and single-unit electrophysiological recording techniques. From there he moved to a position as an assistant professor at Texas A&M University, where his research focussed on the effects of both acute and chronic exposure to drugs of abuse on cognition, with a particular focus on decision-making. Dr. Setlow joined the Department of Psychiatry in 2010, where he is continuing his research on interactions between drug abuse and decision-making, as well as collaborating with other UF investigators on animal models of age-related cognitive decline.

Catherine Woodstock Striley, PhD, MSW, ACSW, MPE received the Master of Social Work in 1989 and the Doctorate of Philosophy in Social Work from the Brown School at Washington University in St. Louis in 2002 where she was a National Institute of Mental Health(NIMH) predoctoral fellow. The National Institute on Drug Addiction (R03) funded her dissertation research. She completed the Master of Science in Epidemiology from the Washington University School of Medicine in 2004 and completed a three-year postdoctoral fellowship in Epidemiology and Biostatistics funded by NIH in the Department of Psychiatry in 2005. She was a faculty member in that department from 2005 to June of 2011. She has been a co-investigator on many community-engaged NIH-funded studies conducted by Dr. Linda Cottler among community members, out-of-treatment drug users and women in the criminal justice system. With regards to research in drug use disorder epidemiology, Dr. Striley just completed revising the Substance Abuse Module for Kratom Use Disorder and conducted a study among 80 people who use kratom and as a co-investigator on the National Drug Early Warning System (NDEWS) is managing the Virtual HealthStreet monitoring of new drug trends in the community. She is also in the field with a randomized trial to test two community health worker interventions to increase LDCT screening for lung cancer among women 50 – 77 years old. Dr. Striley is Deputy Director of HealthStreet, a Community Health Worker (CHW) powered research site. Dr. Striley has been very involved in training in ethical research conduct and accountability. She was funded by the Office of Research Integrity to plan and co-direct the First Biannual Responsible Conduct of Research Education Instruction and Training conference at Washington University and was funded by the ORI to run a regional conference on Mentoring for the Responsible Conduct of Research. She currently teaches Population Health in Medicine, Psychiatric Epidemiology, and Ethics for Population Health and mentors PhD, MSE and MPH students. She is the program director for the Master of Science in Epidemiology and the Certificate in Psychiatric Epidemiology programs.

Dr. Bussing holds the position of Professor and Chair of the Department of Psychiatry at UF, and in 2016 was named the Donald Dizney Professor in recognition of her academic leadership role.

Dr. Bussing received her medical degree from the Justus Liebig University in Giessen, Germany. She subsequently completed her psychiatry residency and child and adolescent fellowship at the University of Florida in Gainesville, as well as a Master of Science degree in health services research from the UCLA School of Public Health.

Dr. Bussing’s research expertise spans mental health services, measure development, pharmaco-epidemiology, psychotherapy intervention, and clinical pharmacology trials research. As NIMH-funded investigator studying, she led studies assessing access and quality of care for attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). Dr. Bussing also conducted a double-blind randomized, controlled trial to assess antidepressant medication related activation phenomena in youth with obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD). She was the co-investigator of an NIH funded randomized clinical trial assessing preschoolers’ response to a non-medication intervention for ADHD, Parent Child Interaction Therapy (PCIT). Furthermore, she collaborated on several other pivotal NIH funded children’s mental health services studies and served as principal investigator on multiple pediatric clinical psychopharmacology trials for ADHD, depression, PTSD, panic disorder and Tourette syndrome. More recently, Dr. Bussing collaborated as clinical lead on measure development for the CMS inpatient psychiatric facilities (IPF) quality program, including an IPF-specific readmission measure.

Dr. Bussing has served as reviewer and chair for multiple NIH and CDC study sections and on advisory boards for several organizations, including Children and Adults with Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (CHADD), PCIT International and the National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI).

Dr. McMahon is Professor and Chair of the Department of Pharmacodynamics at the University of Florida College of Pharmacy. He previously held the position of Tenured Associate Professor of Pharmacology at the University of Texas Health Science Center in San Antonio. He obtained a PhD in Behavioral Neuroscience from Texas A&M University, and was a postdoctoral fellow in the Department of Pharmacology and Toxicology at the University of Texas Medical Branch in Galveston. He has been continuously funded by the National Institute on Drug Abuse since 2002 as PI of 6 R01 grants, an R21, and a U grant for a total of $22M in funding. He is a regular member of the Center for Scientific Review NIH study section Biobehavioral Regulation, Learning and Ethology. He served on the Executive Board of the Behavioral Pharmacology Division of the American Society of Pharmacology and Experimental Therapeutics. Dr. McMahon’s laboratory integrates principles of behavior and receptor theory to identify CNS mechanisms responsible for drug dependence, and novel pharmacological strategies that maximize therapeutics and minimize abuse liability.