Welcome to the
Behavioral
Neuroendocrinology
Lab
Dr. Elizabeth K. Lucas, Principal Investigator
Department of Psychiatry & Behavioral Neurobiology
HEERSINK SCHOOL OF MEDICINE, UNIVERSITY OF ALABAMA AT BIRMINGHAM
Research in the Lucas Lab is driven by a passion to improve the lives of people with mental illness. We conduct preclinical research in mouse models to understand the mechanisms underlying susceptibility to psychiatric illness, with an emphasis on sex as a biological factor. Women are twice as likely as men to be diagnosed with fear-, anxiety-, and mood-based psychiatric disorders, but the exclusion of female subjects in preclinical research has hindered our progress in elucidating the sex-specific neurobiological bases of such illnesses. Our laboratory utilizes a multifaceted, systems-based approach that combines in vivo behavioral manipulations with ex vivo electrophysiological, transcriptional, anatomical, and endocrinological analyses in mouse models to dissect the neurobiological mechanisms underlying sex differences in behavioral states relevant to mental illness at the levels of the cell and the circuit. This research seeks to expand upon previous research conducted by ourselves and others, in hopes of attaining novel, potentially sex-specific, therapeutic targets for devastating mental illnesses disproportionally experienced by women, for which there are currently limited effective treatments and no cures.
