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Erica Townsend, PhD

@ericastownsend.bsky.social
118 followers 130 following 22 posts
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Reposted by Erica Townsend, PhD
Kenneth Amaya, PhD @kenam15.bsky.social · 02/09/2026
Attention all central amygdala aficionados and habit learning lovers: Sharing the latest work from my time at Dartmouth where we examined CeA activity during habit formation, now out at JNeuro www.jneurosci.org/content/earl...
jneurosci.org
Habit learning shapes activity dynamics in the central nucleus of the amygdala
A habit develops as a motivated behavior that is strengthened by extended experience and feedback. While the performance component of a habit is relatively well studied, being linked to action-related...
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Reposted by Erica Townsend, PhD
Kate Nautiyal @katenautiyal.bsky.social · 16/03/2026
Please spread the word about a postbac position in Behavioral Neuroscience at Dartmouth with me, Shelley Warlow, and Kyle smith. The postbac will contribute to collaborative projects across the three labs aimed at studying the neuroscience of motivation and reward learning.
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Reposted by Erica Townsend, PhD
Daniela Garrod (she/her) @danielagarrod.bsky.social · 13/04/2026
In the spirit of using this app more, I am happy to share that I received the Graduate Student Fellowship from the Center on Compulsive Behavior at the NIH. Really excited for this project looking at the neuromodulatory landscape of mPFC SST interneurons across species! Thank you to my PI & lab!
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Reposted by Erica Townsend, PhD
Marvin Maechler, PhD @maechlermarvin.bsky.social · 20/02/2026
I'm honored to receive the Penn AI Fellowship with support from @upenndddi.bsky.social! The fellowship supports my research on computational models of perception and cognitive bias. Specifically, we want to understand when and why both brains and AI systems are susceptible to cognitive biases.
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Reposted by Erica Townsend, PhD
Colette Delawalla, PhD @cdelawalla.bsky.social · 24/01/2026
Alex Pretti was a scientist.
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Reposted by Erica Townsend, PhD
Minnesota Star Tribune @startribune.com · 23/01/2026
Thousands of Minnesotans marched in downtown Minneapolis to protest ICE. The wind chill was 30 below during the march. Hundreds of businesses closed their doors Friday in support of the protest as activists urged Minnesotans to abstain from economic activity.
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Reposted by Erica Townsend, PhD
Kate Nautiyal @katenautiyal.bsky.social · 21/12/2025
New paper drop! 🧠💊 Our new paper out in Molecular Psychiatry shows that the serotonin 1B receptor is important for the neural and antidepressant/anxiolytic behavioral responses to psilocybin in mice. www.nature.com/articles/s41...
nature.com
The serotonin 1B receptor is required for some of the behavioral effects of psilocybin in mice - Molecular Psychiatry
Molecular Psychiatry - The serotonin 1B receptor is required for some of the behavioral effects of psilocybin in mice
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Reposted by Erica Townsend, PhD
Munir “Gunes” Kutlu @guneskutlu.bsky.social · 13/12/2025
🚨New Kutlu Lab preprint! Excited to share our latest work led by Oyku Dinckol and Noah Wenger. 🔗 www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6... We find that ACh shapes DLS neural ensembles for outcome learning but is biased toward signaling threats over rewards 👇
biorxiv.org
Dorsolateral striatal acetylcholine reorganizes neural ensembles to anticipate threat
Adaptive behavior requires flexible encoding of emotional valence. Although striatal acetylcholine (ACh) signaling is critical for reinforcement learning, its contribution to aversive learning has rem...
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Erica Townsend, PhD @ericastownsend.bsky.social · 12/12/2025
very excited to share some of the final bits of work from my PhD! 🎉 we find that phasic DA in the accumbens simultaneously tracks persistent motivation towards reward cues in addition to new learning (but maybe not RPE?!) in sign-tracking rats. check out the preprint below!
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Reposted by Erica Townsend, PhD
Jackie Gio @jackiegio.bsky.social · 10/12/2025
Huge congrats to Gio Lab postdoc Dr @ericastownsend.bsky.social on her poster award at Temple’s Department of Neural Sciences Research Day!
media.tenor.com
a little girl is crying while holding her fist in the air and the word exciting is on the bottom .
ALT: a little girl is crying while holding her fist in the air and the word exciting is on the bottom .
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Reposted by Erica Townsend, PhD
SfN Journals @sfnjournals.bsky.social · 19/06/2025
#JNeurosci: A functional MRI study from @maechlermarvin.bsky.social‬ et al. identify brain regions that might be the source of hemifield-specific capacity limits in attentional tracking of multiple moving objects. vist.ly/3n7a9wt
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Erica Townsend, PhD @ericastownsend.bsky.social · 15/06/2025
well its officially official - I graduated yesterday! 🎓 super honored to have also received my department’s promise award in brain science research. pumped to start my postdoc next month!!
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Reposted by Erica Townsend, PhD
Marvin Maechler, PhD @maechlermarvin.bsky.social · 30/05/2025
I am excited to announce (belatedly) that my dissertation’s final chapter has been published in the Journal of Neuroscience! doi.org/10.1523/JNEU...
doi.org
Hemifield Specificity of Attention Response Functions during Multiple-Object Tracking
The difficulty of tracking multiple moving objects among identical distractors increases with the number of tracked targets. Previous research has shown that the number of targets tracked (i.e., load)...
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Erica Townsend, PhD @ericastownsend.bsky.social · 10/05/2025
defended my dissertation and officially became Dr. Townsend yesterday! 🍾 feeling so much gratitude for my friends and family, my wonderful advisor, the bluesky-less Kyle Smith, and the many mentors & colleagues who supported me along the way 🩷
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Erica Townsend, PhD @ericastownsend.bsky.social · 10/03/2025
despite the horrors, I will continue to share and engage with science without fear!! thus, I'm very happy to share my recent article out in Learning & Memory. I'm so proud of this work. it's been my little passion project for some time now. a student of mine, Angela Shang, even made the cover art!
the cover of learning and memory's march issue with a beautiful illustration of a rat playing pavlovian dance dance revolution. art by angela shang
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Reposted by Erica Townsend, PhD
Dartmouth Psychological and Brain Sciences @dartmouthpbs.bsky.social · 03/03/2025
We are organizing a Stand Up for Science rally at Dartmouth College! When: This Friday, March 7th, at 12pm (noon) Where: Center of the Dartmouth Green
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Reposted by Erica Townsend, PhD
christine liu / two photon art @christineliu.art · 22/01/2025
Step 1) find your rep www.congress.gov/members/find... Step 2) send an email or call their office Step 3) tell them that federal spending on scientific advancement is the best hope we have to “win against china” or whatever these guys are obsessed with these days
congress.gov
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Reposted by Erica Townsend, PhD
Zoe McElligott @nanopharmnc.bsky.social · 22/01/2025
I just reached out to my senators about the NIH situation. If you need to find out how much impact NIH has in your state in terms of dollars in and their economic impact here's a link: www.unitedformedicalresearch.org/nih-in-your-...
unitedformedicalresearch.org
NIH In Your State - United For Medical Research
Select a state on the map to see the impact of NIH funding across America.
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Reposted by Erica Townsend, PhD
Kate Nautiyal @katenautiyal.bsky.social · 15/11/2023
TT28 with is the place to be in DC! Come learn about how serotonin modulates reward-related DMS calcium activity.
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Erica Townsend, PhD @ericastownsend.bsky.social · 11/11/2023
if you are interested in behavioral microstructures of motivation, come check out my SfN poster today at board JJ8! we explore sign-tracking responses in depth, favoring detailed analysis of video behavior over automatic readouts (eg, presses per min). come check it out and talk behavior! ☺️
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Erica Townsend, PhD @ericastownsend.bsky.social · 09/11/2023
using my first bluesky post to say that i officially started my dissertation process and i am ABD 🥂🥳
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