Society for Neuroscience honors 4 top researchers

The Society for Neuroscience last fall honored two leading researchers for their contributions to the advancement of women in neuroscience and two early-career researchers who show great originality and creativity in their work.  The awards were presented during Neuroscience 2019, the Society for Neuroscience’s annual meeting Oct. 19.

Marina Picciotto, Ph.D. was the recipient of the Bernice Grafstein Award for Outstanding Accomplishments in Mentoring. Picciotto is a professor of psychiatry, pharmacology, and neuroscience at Yale University, and has successfully mentored 22 female graduate and post-doctoroal scientists.

Hollis Cline, Ph.D. received the Mika Salpeter Lifetime Achievement Award, which honors neuroscientists with outstanding achievements in research who have significantly promoted the professional advancement of women in neuroscience. Cline is the chair of the department of neuroscience at the Scripps Research Institute. The work she has done on cellular interactions in the retina and brain of the frog have allowed researchers to examine neurons not previously accessible.

Two researchers received the Janett Rosenberg Trubatch Career Development Award: Zoe Donaldson, Ph.D, and Michael Yartsev, Ph.D.

Donaldson is an assistant professor in the departments of molecular, cellular and developmental biology, and psychology and neuroscience at University of Colorado, Boulder. She developed the first germline transgenic prairie voles, using it as a model for social neuroscience. She has received the NIH Director’s New Innovator Award as well as multiple fellowships from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation.   

Yartsev is the assistant professor in the bioengineering department and the Helen Willis Neuroscience Institute at University of California, Berkeley.  He applies neural techniques to understand how bats’ brains function in terms of spatial behavior and social behavior, as well as the vocalization system to understand how the brain works as they communicate. He has received several awards since joining UC Berkeley, including the Packard Fellowship for Science and Engineering, the Pew Scholar Award and the New York Stem Cells Foundation Investigator Award.