Anna Verghese

Anna graduated with a Bachelor of Arts in Economics and a minor in Neuroscience from the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) with college honors in Spring 2023. Through the Interdisciplinary Sustainable LA Grand Challenge (SLAGC) Scholar Program during her third year, she joined the lab of Dr. Melissa Sharpe to complete an independent project on sensory-specific cue associations and the neural learning circuits underlying maladaptive behavior in addiction. Her work cumulated in her honors thesis, The Effect of Noncontingent Methamphetamine on Reward Learning in Rats. During her final year, she worked as a lab technician for the Sharpe lab and conducted research on dopamine release in the nucleus accumbens.

Anna joined the Sharott Group in September 2023 to provide research support for ongoing projects utilizing high density in vivo electrophysiological recordings with deep brain stimulation (DBS) in freely behaving rodents. By examining memory and cognitive function, these experiments aim to develop a closed loop stimulation approach with potential clinical applications.