BIO/NSCI SEMINAR: “A Beautiful Mind: The Neuroprotective Properties of Dietary Choline”, Melissa J. Glenn, PhD, Colby

Talk by Melissa J. Glenn, PhD, Associate Professor of Psychology at Colby College: During early life, environmental factors exert significant influence over the developing brain and organize systems and structures in ways that continue to be evident across the lifespan. One particular factor to which the brain is exquisitely tuned is the dietary availability of specific nutrients. In my lab, we study the essential nutrient, choline, and the extent to which its availability during early life is neuroprotective. We have found that pre- and postnatal choline supplementation protects adult rats from the kinds of stressful events or genetic predispositions that can induce depressive- or schizophrenia-like symptoms. We are exploring several hypotheses about how choline may influence the organization and function of neural systems to produce these effects in adulthood, including epigenetic regulation of gene expression, modulation of hippocampal plasticity, and alterations to dopaminergic signaling.
(Lunch available at 12:15pm)

Sponsored by the Department of Biology, and Program in Neuroscience. Visit www.middlebury.edu/academics/bio