Mike Beckstead

Great work Matt, congrats to you, Morgan and the team!

Estrous cycle stage gates the effect of stress on reward learning Neuropsychopharmacology - Estrous cycle stage gates the effect of stress on reward learning

Ever wonder how stress and the estrous cycle affects reward learning? Well we have answers for you in our paper led by @askaneuroscientist.bsky.social published in
@npp-journal.bsky.social

And huge thanks to the NIH and NSF who supported this research.

Sex‐Specific Adaptations to VTA Circuits Following Subchronic Stress Subchronic variable stress, a paradigm shown to have divergent behavioral effects in males and females, induces shared and distinct physiological adaptations in the VTA. While both males and females ...

New work from my lab looking at how dopamine neurons are affected by stress and males and females! This paper comes to you through three rounds of major building construction, a pandemic, six months that we could not get TTX, some animal facility shenanigans and now is here on your internet!

This is absolute bullshit. Michael is one of the most creative scientists I've ever met, exactly the type of work the country should be investing in

Congrats @harrisedwardb.bsky.social on your defense/graduation! The journey has been a lot of fun, and save those ‘extra letters’ because you’ll need them for what happens next!

Congratulations Julia!!!!!

Incredible friend, peer mentor, adventurous collaborator (patcher of “bricks”), and now DR. Blankenship @harrisedwardb.bsky.social defended the most brilliant dissertation yesterday.

Top line P3 data for Orforglipron the once daily oral GLP-1 medicine in PPL with #T2D investor.lilly.com/news-release...

So proud of our new work comparing opioid self-administration between old (24 mo!) and young mice. We found that the old mice learned self-administration faster and took more remifentanil than the young mice. Great job team!
@mikebeckstead.bsky.social
@laciiiiiiiiiiii.bsky.social
bit.ly/3G7lJE7

Harvard has set an example for other higher-ed institutions - rejecting an unlawful and ham-handed attempt to stifle academic freedom, while taking steps to make sure students can benefit from an environment of intellectual inquiry, rigorous debate and mutual respect. Let’s hope others follow suit.

Reelin marks cocaine-activated striatal neurons, promotes neuronal excitability, and regulates cocaine reward Reelin is a critical mechanistic link between neuronal activation and cocaine-induced behavioral adaptations.

Excited to see this NIDA supported work from lab PhD student Kasey Brida officially published! Kasey identified a marker of neurons that are responsive to the psychostimulant drug cocaine, and discovered that this marker is essential for cocaine reward.
www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

Changes in neurotensin signalling drive hedonic devaluation in obesity - Nature In mice, prolonged consumption of a high-fat diet decreases interest in calorie-rich foods as a result of reduced neurotensin expression and signalling, which uncouples hedonic feeding behaviour linke...

Why does obesity change the pleasure of eating, the dopamine rush from hedonic foods? A neural circuit mechanism involving explanation
www.nature.com/articles/s41...

just learned that one of my former trainees had her grant terminated at Columbia. I am sick...

New Pre-Print led by @emilyprevost.bsky.social Glutamate-dopamine, nonglu-dopamine, and glu-only neurons and neurotransmitters they use have dissociable contributions to motivated behavior. Important to segregate DA subcell-types to better understand the many motivation-related functions of DA

A dual-pathway architecture for stress to disrupt agency and promote habit - Nature Adaptive decision-making often requires an understanding of our agency in a situation; however, chronic stress can disrupt agency and promote inflexible, habitual behaviour by turning off a brain path...

🚨📃New Wassum Lab Paper📃🚨

Out today, @jackiegio.bsky.social discovered brain pathways that support agency and habit and how chronic stress disrupts them to rob of us our agency and cause us to form rigid habits 🧵👇

www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Free full text: rdcu.be/eaxEv

MCNP study section cancelled the day before it was supposed to meet, with no future date set or suggested. What a fucking disaster.

Staining in green (TH) to label noradrenergic neurons and magenta (pTau) in a tissue section through the locus coeruleus in the human brain

The locus coeruleus is located in the brainstem and is among the first regions in the human 🧠 to acquire pathology in Alzheimer's disease. Loss of neurons in the locus coeruleus is directly linked to cognitive decline. 🟢TH labels noradrenergic neurons; 🟣 pTau labels neurofibrillary tangles 🔬👩‍🔬🧪

A new, non-opioid pain drug is here. Getting it to patients could be agony. After decades of research, Vertex Pharmaceuticals now has an approved pain medication. Can one of the world’s most powerful biotechs contend with a healthcare system that’s long favored opioids?

An excellent story on Suzetrigine, which I guess we have to start calling Journavx, in Biopharma Dive with a few quotes from me: www.biopharmadive.com/news/pain-dr... but this is my favorite point of the article, from the CEO of Vertex:

Parental origin of transgene modulates amyloid-β plaque burden in the 5xFAD mouse model of Alzheimer’s disease The 5xFAD transgenic model, popular in Alzheimer’s disease research, exhibits varying cerebral plaque burden depending on the parental source of the transgene. Mice inheriting the transgene paternally...

Are you using 5xFAD mice to study Alzheimer’s disease? Our work out today @cp-neuron.bsky.social may be relevant to you 🐁🧠 Age and sex are known to influence Aβ plaque burden in these mice. Here, we found that the transgene parentage is another strong determinant.

Thread below: (1/11)

🚨SAVE THE DATE‼️

Happy to announce that #DopamineMeeting2026 will be held in
S E V I L L A🧠.

May, 17-21, 2026

Whew! What started in August with first draft Aims pages ended today with two trainees (Laci and William) submitting their F grants, both A0s and with me away at ACNP so I couldn’t help much with the final push. I’m not sure if either is on Bsky yet but great job & drinks are on me when I get back!

Neuronal heterogeneity in the ventral tegmental area: distinct contributions to reward circuitry and motivated behavior The ventral tegmental area (VTA) is a critical component of brain reward circuitry that influences motivation, learning, and emotional regulation. Alt…

Excited to see this review manuscript from lab MD/PhD student Dalton Fitzgerald officially out in Addiction Neuroscience!
www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

One of the cats was pukey yesterday so my wife spread out the blankets to protect the couch. But every time we do this they self-segregate by color as if they think "well gee, this must be my new designated area." 🤣

Binge drinking rewires the brain, increases Alzheimer's risk even if you quit Too much heavy drinking during your college years can have a lasting and devastating impact on the neurons in your brain, even if you stop drinking after this period of your life.

Check out this cool write up of our new Neurobiology of Aging paper! Fun collaboration with @eaproctor.bsky.social
studyfinds.org/binge-drinki...

You can read the paper here: www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

(This is also how I learned my dad has a Google Alert set up for my name 😂)

Alcohol and Alzheimer's have a pretty strong link that is under active investigation. Not sure it has much to do with dopamine.