Wake Up Narcolepsy is a nonprofit organization dedicated to driving Narcolepsy awareness, education and research towards improved treatments and a cure. They have awarded funds to the lab to study the neural circuits that underly specific symptoms of Narcolepsy.
https://www.wakeupnarcolepsy.org/news/2025-research-update
New paper stemming from a collaboration with Drs. Bethany Beekly and Carol Elias: Lack of glutamate neurotransmission in melanin-concentrating hormone neurons alters mouse reproduction and metabolism in a sex-specific manner
https://link.springer.com/article/10.1186/s13293-025-00742-3
Alvin was awarded a 2 year NIH National Research Service Award (NRSA) Fellowship.
New SleepWorld magazine article by Brandon Toth: https://www.calameo.com/sleeplabmagazine/read/0063720463bd20cb60267
Katie is now completing a ROMS fellowship at Michigan Medicine: https://medresearch.umich.edu/office-research/about-office-research/research-operations-management-strategy-fellowship/meet-roms-team
A pair of recent papers from collaborations between the Burgess lab and Vanini/Johnson labs:
“Devaluing memories of reward: a case for dopamine” (https://www.nature.com/articles/s42003-024-07440-7)
“Regulation of REM and NREM sleep by preoptic glutamatergic neurons” (https://academic.oup.com/sleep/advance-article/doi/10.1093/sleep/zsaf141/8149138)
Congrats to Dr. Alex Hodge on his Dystonia Medical Research Foundation Postdoctoral fellowship!
Recent Burgess lab paper: “Melanin-Concentrating Hormone Projections to the Nucleus Accumbens Enhance the Reward Value of Food Consumption and Do Not Induce Feeding or REM Sleep”
https://www.jneurosci.org/content/45/10/e1725242024.long
New Burgess lab publication: “Phasic Dopamine Release in the Nucleus Accumbens Influences REM Sleep Timing”
https://www.jneurosci.org/content/45/9/e1374242024
In work led by Chris Phillips (PhD candidate at UT Dallas) we characterized dopamine release across the striatum as mice learned and executed a skilled reaching task.
Phillips, C. D., Hodge, A. T., Myers, C. C., Leventhal, D. K. & Burgess, C. R. Striatal dopamine contributions to skilled motor learning. J. Neurosci. (2024) doi:10.1523/JNEUROSCI.0240-24.2024
https://www.jneurosci.org/content/early/2024/05/22/JNEUROSCI.0240-24.2024
Brandon was awarded an F31 Ruth L. Kirschstein Predoctoral Individual National Research Service Award from NINDS and a 2023 SRS Foundation Small Research Grant. And Alvin was awarded a Rackham Candidate Research Grant.
Congratulations to Brandon, Katie, and Sarah on our recent publication outlining a role for striatal dopamine in the regulation of sleep and cataplexy.
Toth, B. A., Chang, K. S., Fechtali, S. & Burgess, C. R. Dopamine release in the nucleus accumbens promotes REM sleep and cataplexy. iScience 26, (2023)
