People – Reissner Lab

Principal Investigator

Kate Reissner, PhD

Principal Investigator
Email: kreissne@email.unc.edu

Kate received a bachelor’s degree in Chemistry from Duke University and a PhD from the Department of Neurobiology and Behavior at UC Irvine, where she studied in the lab of Tom Carew. Following postdoctoral research in the lab of Peter Kalivas at the Medical University of South Carolina, Kate joined the Department of Psychology and Neuroscience and the Neuroscience Curriculum as an Assistant Professor in 2013. Kate accepts graduate students both through the Behavioral and Integrative Neuroscience (BIN) Program in the Department of Psychology and Neuroscience as well as through the Biological and Biomedical Science Program (BBSP) Neuroscience Program.

Lab Members

Tania Bellinger

Graduate Student

Tania pursued her undergraduate degree at Winston-Salem State University, where she worked part-time in an organic chemistry lab under Dr. Fenghai Guo’s mentorship. She graduated with a Bachelor of Science in Biology in 2020. In August 2020, she began her graduate studies in the Biological and Biomedical Sciences Program (BBSP) at UNC. Tania is currently a Ph.D. candidate in the UNC Pharmacology Graduate Program. Her research focuses on exploring the involvement of nucleus accumbens microglia in long-access cocaine self-administration and relapse vulnerability.

Janay Franklin

Graduate Student
Email: jafrank@email.unc.edu

Janay was raised in Red Springs, NC. She attended North Carolina A&T State University, where she received her B.S. in Biology in 2017. After graduating, she began a post-bac in the UNC-Chapel Hill PREP program, where she conducted research in the Bowles Center for Alcohol Studies. Here, Janay worked under Dr. Joyce Besheer while studying the potential anxiogenic-like effects of predator odor on alcohol consumption via self-administration. At the conclusion of her post-bac, she began her graduate school journey under the Neuroscience Curriculum in the Biological and Biomedical Sciences Program (BBSP) at UNC-Chapel Hill. Currently, her research in the Reissner lab focuses on identifying the potential mechanism(s) for the decreased astrocytic structure observed following prolonged abstinence of cocaine self-administration. Janay is an advocate of increasing educational equity and is passionate about increasing diversity and support for diverse populations within the STEM field.

Eden Harder

Graduate Student
Email: edenvh@live.unc.edu

Eden graduated from the University of California, Irvine with a BS in Neurobiology in 2019. There, she studied the effects of THC on adolescent brain and behavior, under the mentorship of Professor Steve Mahler. She is now a graduate student in UNC’s Behavioral and Integrative Neuroscience Program. In the Reissner lab, she is interested in astroglial functional changes underlying incubation of cocaine craving.

Suzanne Sherrill

Lab Manager
Email: Se5sherr@email.unc.edu

I have a BS in Animal Sciences from the University of Maryland. I worked at NIH as a biologist for 12 years.

Lab Alumni

Emily Witt

Graduate Student
Email: witt.ea@unc.edu
PhD 2022
Current position: Post doc in lab of Angelo Lulianella, Dalhousie University

Anze Testen

Graduate Student
Email: anze_testen@med.unc.edu
PhD 2017
Current position: Post doc in the lab of Peter Kalivas, The Medical University of South Carolina