Assistant Professor, Neurobiology University of Pittsburgh Phone: (412) 648-1442 Fax: (412) 648-1441 Email: thiels@neurobio.pitt.edu

Ph.D., Indiana University

Research Interests

The main research interest of Dr. Thiels is how animals acquire information from the environment and use that information to guide their behavior. Understanding of the biological substrates of learning and memory is one of the most sought-after goals of neuroscience because of the universality of these cognitive faculties and their utmost importance for survival in a variable environment. Growing evidence indicates that learning and memory involve specific neural circuits and, within these circuits, specific physiological, biochemical, and molecular processes. Likely neurophysiological substrates of learning and memory include experience-induced changes in the strength of synaptic communication. Dr. Thiels' laboratory studies experience-dependent synaptic plasticity in the hippocampus, a structure in the medial temporal lobes critical for the acquisition and storage of episodic and factual memories.  Another, recently initiated line of study in the laboratory focuses on experience-dependent alterations of function in brain circuits implicated in reward learning and drug addiction.  This work is aimed at advancing our understanding of cue-induced drug craving and relapse.  The experimental apporaches applied in Dr. Thiels' laboratory provide trainees with the opportunity to learn in vivo electrophysiological, pharmacological, biochemical, and behavior analysis techniques.

Recent Publications

• Shiflet MW, Martini RP, Mauna JC, Foster RL, Peet E, Thiels E:  Cue-elicited reward-seeking requires ERK activation in the nucleus accumbens.  J Neurosci 28: 1434-43, 2008.
• Hu D, Klann E, Thiels E:  Superoxide dismutase and hippocampal function:  Age and isozyme matter.  Antiox & Redox Signal 9: 201-210, 2007.
• Calixto E, Thiels E, Klann E, Barrionuevo G:  Early maintenance of hippocampal mossy fiber-LTP depends on protein synthesis and presynaptic granule cell integrity.  J Neurosci 23: 4842-4849.
• Thiels E, Kanterewicz BI, Norman ED, Trzaskos JM, Klann E:  Long-term depression in the adult hippocampus in vivo involves activation of extracellular signal-regulated kinase and phosphorylation of Elk-1.  J Neurosci 22: 2054-2062, 2002.
• Thiels E, Klann E:  Extracellular signal-regulated kinase, synaptic plasticity, and memory.  Rev Neurosci 12: 327-345, 2001.