SRCLD Presentation Details
  Title  
       
    The Quest for Genes Regulating Cognitive Processes: from Mouse to Man  
Author(s)
Jeanne M. Wehner - University of Colorado

SRCLD Info
SRCLD Year: 2004
Presentation Type: Invited Speaker
Presentation Time: (na)
Abstract
Individual differences in behavior are regulated by both environmental and genetic factors. Elucidating the genes regulating the genetic component underlying normal behaviors as well as behavioral manifestations of genetic disorders is challenging. There are a growing number of resources that are becoming available to aid in the difficult search for genes regulating complex behaviors. The mouse has been used extensively in the field of genetics and is being applied to gene discovery studies in many areas including obesity, diabetes, heart disease, and asthma. More recently the mouse has been used to model phenotypes related to cognitive function and psychiatric illness. The presentation will emphasize learning and memory processes that are being studied in the mouse. The discussion will highlight results from various mouse models including those produced by single gene manipulation and those with the goal of mapping genes regulating individual variation. How the information gained in the mouse might be translated into humans will also be discussed.
Author Biosketch(es)

Jeanne M. Wehner, Ph.D

Dr. Wehner received her Ph.D. from the University of Minnesota in Biochemistry in 1976. She received postdoctoral training at the Dight Institute for Human Genetics at the University of Minnesota studying brain second messenger systems with an emphasis on protein kinases. Her interest in neurogenetics was furthered as a visiting investigator at the Jackson Laboratories where she began using mouse models to explore the genetic regulation of neurochemical processes in the brain. In 1982, she became an Assistant Professor at the University of Colorado Boulder and a faculty fellow at the Institute for Behavioral Genetics (IBG). She currently is an IBG fellow and a Professor of Psychology as well as member of the Neuroscience program.

After joining the faculty at Colorado, Dr. Wehner became interested in merging her interest in biochemistry with functional outcomes related to behavior using the mouse. Modeling behavioral processes of relevance to human behavior and then determining the genetic regulation of these behaviors has been the major emphasis of her laboratory in recent years. She uses inbred strain recombinant inbred strains, and transgenic mouse models as well as quantitative trait loci analyses in her research.

Dr. Wehner had a Research Scientist Development Award from NIAAA from 1991-1996 and 1997-2002. She has served on numerous grant review committees and currently serves on the NIMH Board of Scientific Counselors. She is an Associate Editor for Behavioral Neuroscience and Behavior Genetics. She has directed the graduate training program at the Institute for Behavioral Genetics for many years and is the program director of a training grant from NIMH. Her teaching includes: graduate level courses in Behavior Genetics, the Molecular Basis of Behavior, and lectures on the molecular basis of learning and memory. She has taught short courses in mouse behavior for the Society for Neuroscience and has participated in The Jackson Laboratory’s short course, Medical and Experimental Mammalian Genetics.