Michael Cahill
Position title: Assistant Professor, Comparative Biosciences
Email: michael.cahill@wisc.edu
Phone: Synapse, plasticity, environmental risk factor, neurodevelopment
Address:
Education
B.A. 2001 Lawrence University, Appleton, WI
Ph.D. 2011 Northwestern University, Evanston, IL
Postdoctoral position 2017 Icahn School of Medicine at Mt. Sinai, New York, New York
NIH Biosketch
PubMed Publications
Departmental Website
Research Focus
Dendritic spines are the sites of most excitatory connections in the central nervous system. The central goal of my laboratory is to delineate the molecular and biochemical mechanisms that regulate dendritic spine plasticity in both the normal and diseased brain. In particular, using animal models, I am interested in recapitulating the genetic and biochemical alterations identified in neurodevelopmental/neuropsychiatric disorders to identify brain region-specific aberrations in dendritic spine formation, stability, and experience-dependent remodeling. I then aim to understand how these regional synaptic changes, in turn, contribute to specific disease-associated behavioral phenotypes. Finally, I am interested in understanding how both prenatal and postnatal environmental-based risk factors for neurodevelopmental/neuropsychiatric disease interact with specific genetic susceptibility factors to produce synaptic and behavioral phenotypes.
Program Activities
- Joined ERP program: 2017
Trainees
No current ERP students
Past ERP students
- Amanda Vanderplow, PhD ’22