Former A Studio in the Woods Scholarly Resident and Tulane neuroscience professor Jeffrey Tasker has won a $2.1 million grant to study the effects of stress on the brain and how severe stress contributes to the development of mental health disorders.

The five-year grant from the National Institutes of Health will allow Jeffrey Tasker and his team in the Cell & Molecular Biology Department and the Tulane Brain Institute to explore how stress signals can lead to changes in brain circuitry, brain chemistry and behavior.

“Stress contributes significantly to the incidence of mental illness, playing a major role especially in the progression of depression and anxiety disorders,” said Tasker, the Catherine and Hunter Pierson Chair in Neuroscience. Continue Reading….