Laura Giacometti, PhD, is a research assistant professor in the Department of Pharmacology & Physiology at Drexel University College of Medicine.
Dr. Giacometti’s research in the Barker Lab investigates sex differences and hormonal regulation of reward seeking and astrocyte function as well as the mechanisms by which reward seeking is dysregulated following insults to the brain. Despite increasing evidence that men and women exhibit innate and acquired sex differences in brain and behavior, women and female animals have historically been excluded from clinical and preclinical studies. Therefore, we aim to identify overlapping and distinct mechanisms of dysregulated reward seeking in people of all genders to further the development of targeted treatment strategies.