Student Information
Graduate Student
Neuroscience
The College of Lib Arts & Sci
Long Bio
Mentor : Esther B Florsheim
My long term goal is to explore the immunological mechanisms underlying neuro-psychiatric conditions through techniques in behavioral neuroscience and immunology.
Currently I am focused on understanding how Type 2 gut inflammation, modeled through food allergy, influences brain function and contributes to conditions related to chronic anxiety. The immune and nervous systems are the body’s main sensory interfaces that perceive and adapt to the environment. We hypothesize that mast cells form stable interactions with neurons to influence organismal physiology. Disruption of this module might be at the origin of inflammatory conditions. By leveraging technologies from these two fields, we will identify the cellular and molecular mechanisms of neuro-immune interactions at mucosal surfaces.
Education
Arizona State University - PhD Candidate, SOLS Interdisciplinary Graduate Program in Neuroscience (Aug 2021-Present)
Santa Clara University - B.S. in Neuroscience and B.A. in Psychology
Publications
- Simone, Patricia M., Lisa C. Whitfield, Matthew C. Bell, Pooja Kher, and Taylor Tamashiro. "Shifting students toward testing: Impact of instruction and context on self-regulated learning." Cognitive Research: Principles and Implications 8, no. 1 (2023): 14.
- Harper, J. René, Neeraja Sripada, Pooja Kher, Justen B. Whittall, and Janice S. Edgerly. "Interpreting nature’s finest insect silks (Order Embioptera): hydropathy, interrupted repetitive motifs, and fiber-to-film transformation for two neotropical species." Zoology 146 (2021): 125923.