hannah

Graduate Student Hannah Brinkman was recently awarded a two-year Ruth L. Kirschstein Predoctoral Fellowship from the National Institute on Drug Abuse. The project, entitled "Smoking-related Differences in Baroreflex Sensitivity and Fear Inhibition in Adults Who Do and Do Not Smoke Cigarettes” aims to characterize the effects of cigarette use on physiological processes that support body-brain communication and how smoking-related impairments in these processes increase anxiety risk. The project includes a mentoring team comprised of Drs. Teresa Leyro, Samantha Farris, Jennifer Buckman (SAS/CAS), and Anthony Pawlak (SAS/CAS) along with additional faculty from Boston University and the University of Vermont. With this all-star mentoring team, the award will provide the opportunity for Hannah to receive training in mechanism-focused experimental design and implementation, translational models of addiction and anxiety, psychophysiological data analysis and interpretation, and research dissemination.