Does Absence Make the Heart Grow Fonder?
Tuesday, 25 January, 2022 6:00 pmZoom (online, register below)
Why exactly does “absence make the heart grow fonder?” BrainStorm Neuroscience Pitch Competition™ 2020 winner Merridee Lefner, and Matthew Wanat (Wanat Lab, The University of Texas at San Antonio) are analyzing the neurobiology of motivated behavior. If we wait longer for something we desire, do we want it more and if so, why? Join us for an update on Dr. Lefner’s BrainStorm project and learn about her journey as an early-career researcher.
Merridee Lefner
Merridee Lefner is a postdoctoral neuroscientist in the lab of Dr. Matthew Wanat at the University of Texas at San Antonio. Merridee grew up in Harlingen, a city within the Texas Rio Grande Valley. She wanted to be a scientist ever since she was young, but her interest in how the brain works grew after her grandmother was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease.
Merridee moved to San Antonio in 2012 and attended college at UTSA, where she obtained her Bachelor’s degree in Biology with a concentration in Neurobiology. She started working in the Wanat lab as an undergraduate volunteer, and enjoyed the research projects so much that she decided to pursue graduate school at UTSA as well. Merridee’s dissertation research collectively investigated the neural correlates of acquiring and updating reward value. She received her Ph.D. in Neuroscience from UTSA in December 2021.
Merridee is continuing her research projects as a postdoctoral fellow in the Wanat lab through the Spring 2022 semester. She is currently searching for outside postdoctoral opportunities to expand her skills and research questions. Her goal is to one day lead her own research lab so that she may continue to delineate the neural signals that underlie motivated behaviors.