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February & March 2025 Newsletter
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*Don't Forget the Annual Symposium!*
April 6th and 7th, 2025
More Info Below!
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Watch February's Recorded Seminar
Thank you, Dr. Sara Jo Nixon for a great seminar on February 19th AND thank you to all who were able to attend! Dr. Sara Jo Nixon, Distinguished Professor and Director of UF CARE, focuses her research on substance abuse and dependence using comprehensive behavioral assessments including neuropsychological testing, brain electrophysiology (electroencephalography and event-related potentials), and clinical research interviews.
If you couldn’t attend, watch her recorded seminar "Alcohol Use with Age: It Can't Matter, They Don't Drink Much- Right?" on the UF CARE website, linked below.
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Dissertation Aid Grant Applications NOW OPEN!
UF CARE is excited to support our affiliate members with the Spring/Summer 2025 Dissertation Award Grants at the level of up to $7500/each. The deadline for submitting applications is April 18th, 2025. Applicants MUST be UF CARE affiliate members and have successfully completed their qualifying exam at the time of application. Otherwise, they are not eligible for the current round of funding. More information and the application can be found here.
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Spring/Summer Travel Awards NOW OPEN!
The call for our spring/summer travel awards is also now open! Trainees may apply if they are attending a national/international meeting in which they are presenting a poster or giving a talk. Trainee mentors must be members of UF CARE. These funds provide support for travel and/or registration as needed. Awards are up to $750—but remember trainees may be awarded a total of $750/calendar year. The deadline for submitting applications is March 27th, 2025Click here for eligibility requirements and to apply!
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RECOGNITION AND ACHIEVEMENTS
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Dr. Linda Cottler
Dr. Linda Cottler (Professor, Department of Epidemiology) is the PI on a renewed U01 grant from NIDA/NIH for the National Drug Early Warning System Coordinating Center (NDEWS) totaling $999,866 annually for five years! Congratulations Dr. Cottler and the NDEWS team!
Additionally, Dr. Cottler’s community engagement initiative, HealthStreet—which connects individuals with vital medical and social services—was recently featured in The Alligator in the article "Healthcare Remains Underprovided for Gainesville’s Homeless Community," linked below.
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Dr. Marek Schwendt
Dr. Marek Schwendt (Associate Professor, Department of Psychology) is a PI on an R03 from NIH/NIDA entitled “Assessing the dose- and sex-dependent effects of oxytocin on opioid demand and reinstatement." UF CARE member Dr. Lori Knackstedt is a Co-I and UF CARE Affiliate Elizabeth Colley is a graduate trainee also working on the grant. Congratulations!
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Dr. Brandon Warren
Dr. Brandon Warren (Assistant Professor, Department of Pharmacodynamics) presented on "The role of dmPFC neuronal ensembles in cocaine-seeking." at the Department of Neuroscience and McKnight Brain Institute Joint Seminar Series on March 6th, 2025! If you were unable to attend and would like a recording of the seminar, please email Sarah Burns (sarahburns1@ufl.edu)
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Haylee Hammond
Congratulations to affiliate member Haylee Hammond for defending their thesis proposal on December 19th, 2024! Their mentoring team consists of UF CARE members Drs. Jay McLaughlin and Brandon Warren.
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Caitlin Orsini, PhD
Congratulations to UF CARE alumna Dr. Caitlin Orsini (mentor: Dr. Barry Setlow, 2012-2019) who recently earned tenure and promotion to Associate Professor in the Department of Psychology at the University of Texas at Austin!
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Taylor Rohleen
Congratulations to Taylor Rohleen, a staff affiliate working in Dr. Liana Hone's Reducing Intoxicant Involved Sexual Consequences (RIISC) Lab, who was accepted to the University of Central Florida's Clinical Psychology PhD program! She will be joining the STRIVE Lab within UCF's Substance Use Research Group.
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Nathan Wydra
Congratulations to Nathan Wydra, a first-year doctoral student (mentor: Joy Gabrielli) for winning a Diversity Professional Development Award from the APA Division 53: Society of Clinical Child and Adolescent Psychology!
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Alex’s poster stems from and is supported by the parent grant "Identifying patterns of human polysubstance use to guide development of rodent models" led by MPIs Drs. Lori Knackstedt and Linda Cottler and Co-Is Drs. Marek Schwendt and Barry Setlow. The grant aims to back-translate human patterns of cocaine-alcohol and cocaine-cannabis polysubstance use (PSU) into rodent models to test the hypothesis that there are overlapping and distinct neurocircuitries underlying cocaine relapse in cocaine monosubstance use and cocaine-alcohol polysubstance use. Click the button below to learn more!
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Welcome our latest Affiliate Members!
We welcome one new affiliate member: Amy Heaton, an undergraduate trainee in the Department of Biology (mentor: Dr. Lori Knackstedt)!If you are a UF CARE faculty member and you're working with outstanding trainees in addiction science, click here to nominate them for affiliate membership. And if you are a UF CARE faculty member working with outstanding staff in addiction sciences, click here to nominate them for staff affiliate membership!
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RECENT PUBLICATIONS AND PRESENTATIONS
Brice-Tutt, A. C., Murphy, N. P., Setlow, B., Senetra, A. S., Malphurs, W., Caudle, R. M., Bruijnzeel, A. W., Febo, M., Sharma, A., & Neubert, J. K. (2025). Cannabidiol interactions with oxycodone analgesia in an operant orofacial cutaneous thermal pain assay following oral administration in rats. Pharmacology, biochemistry, and behavior, 173968. Advance online publication. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.pbb.2025.173968
Conger C, Cottler LB. Health concerns, access to care, and trust in research and researchers among community members with bipolar disorder. Discov Ment Health. 2024 Sep 10;4(1):34. doi: 10.1007/s44192-024-00091-4. PMID: 39254896; PMCID: PMC11387570.
Cottler, LB. December 2024: Invited Presentation: 2024 ACNP Annual Meeting, Phoenix AZ, Assessing PSU in Humans for Backtranslational Models in Rodents.
Cottler, LB. February 14, 2025: Presented to the Community Coalition for Older Adults on Why You May Want to be 1 in a Million: All of Us-Personalizing Prevention, Treatment and Care for All Americans. CCOA is co-chaired by CARE Affiliate Faculty, Dr. Striley
Cottler, LB. February 27: Presented to the LEAP Professional Development Program for Undergraduate students at PHHP on my work in epidemiology and overall career path.
Hammond HR, Chaudhari P, Bunnell A, Nefzi K, Chen C, Zhao P, Eans SO, Masood, SR, Dooley CT, Liu-Chen L-Y, McLaughlin JP, Nefzi A: Peripherally-restricted fused heterocyclic peptidomimetic multifunctional opioid agonists as novel, potent analgesics. Accepted, ACS Med Chem Letters, 1-31-2025
Palamar JJ, Fitzgerald ND, Goldberger BA, Cottler LB. Monitoring illicit pentobarbital availability in the United States: A National Drug Early Warning System briefing. Drug Alcohol Depend. 2024 Oct 1;263:112402. doi: 10.1016/j.drugalcdep.2024.112402. Epub 2024 Aug 13. PMID: 39173219; PMCID: PMC11384643.
Varga BR, Bernhard SM, El Daibani A, Zaidi S, Lam JH, Aguilar J, Appourchaux K, Nazarova A, Kouvelis A, Shinouchi R, Hammond HR, Eans SO, Weinreb V, Margolis EB, Fay JF, Huang X-P, Pradhan A, Katritch V, McLaughlin JP, Majumdar S, Che T. Structure-guided design of partial agonists at an opioid receptor. Accepted with minor revisions; Nature Communications, 1-30-2025
Zequeira, S., Gazarov, E. A., Güvenli, A. A., Berthold, E. C., Senetra, A. S., Febo, M., *Hiranita, T., McMahon, L. R., Sharma, A., McCurdy, C. R., Setlow, B., & Bizon, J. L. (2025). Effects of cannabis smoke and oral Δ9THC on cognition in young adult and aged rats. Psychopharmacology, 10.1007/s00213-025-06754-6. Advance online publication. https://doi.org/10.1007/s00213-025-06754-6
Zhu J, Cirincione AB, Strauss MJ, Davis SE, Eans SO, Tribbitt D, Alshakhshir N, McLaughlin JP: Impact of HIV-1 tat protein on methamphetamine-induced inhibition of vesicular monoamine transporter2-mediated dopamine transport and methamphetamine conditioned place preference in HIV-1 tat transgenic mice. Eur. J. Pharmacology, 2024 Dec 5, 984:177030-177041. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ejphar.2024.177030 PMID: 39366503.
***Work featured in "HIV News from NIDA" newsletter in November 2024* denotes a UF CARE alum and continued collaborator. If you are a UF CARE alum, please share updates with us here! |
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Stay in Touch!
Are you a UF CARE alumni OR an affiliate with an upcoming graduation? If you studied addiction-related research at UF, please be sure to give us your most up-to-date contact information so we can stay in touch!
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Not yet a member?
If you are a UF Faculty member working in addiction science and would like to join UF CARE, click below for more information about becoming a full member of UF CARE.
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Have news
to share?
Have updates you'd like to be included in the next UF CARE newsletter? Click below to share news about you and/or your affiliate trainees!
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Support UF CARE!
Philanthropic gifts are essential to fulfilling our mission to improve research and education efforts regarding the critical health threat of addiction. Click below to make a tax-deductible donation!
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