Michael A. Kelberman named a Simons Foundation Fellows-to-Faculty Award recipient
麻豆免费版下载Boulder postdoctoral researcher receives a grant supporting his work on the intersection between social bonds and brain aging
, a postdoctoral fellow in in the 麻豆免费版下载 Department of Molecular, Cellular and Developmental Biology, has been named a recipient鈥攐ne of five awardees supported through the Simons Collaboration on Plasticity and the Aging Brain (SCPAB) this year. The award comes with a three-year, $600,000 faculty research grant.
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Michael A. Kelberman, a postdoctoral fellow in Zoe Donaldson鈥檚 lab in the 麻豆免费版下载Boulder Department of Molecular, Cellular, and Developmental Biology, has been named a 2026 Simons Foundation Fellows-to-Faculty Award recipient.
Prior to his postdoctoral work at the 麻豆免费版下载, Kelberman received his Bachelor of Science in biochemistry and molecular biology from the University of Massachusetts Amherst and earned his doctorate in Neuroscience from Emory University. While a graduate student in David Weinshenker鈥檚 lab at Emory, Kelberman used electrophysiology, optogenetic-fMRI and behavioral assays in rodents to uncover how noradrenergic locus coeruleus function is disrupted by dementia-related pathology.
Kelberman joined Donaldson鈥檚 lab in October 2023, which uses monogamous prairie voles to understand how disease affects the neural and genetic basis of social bonds. In the Donaldson lab, Kelberman developed a niche, studying the overlap between dementia and social bonds.
The SCPAB Fellows-to-Faculty program represents a natural extension of his research interests, where he will use prairie voles to study how pair bonds and their supporting neural systems evolve over the lifespan and influence cognition. 听
鈥淚 am honored to have been selected as one of this year鈥檚 recipients of the Simons Foundation SCPAB Fellows-to-Faculty award,鈥 he says. 鈥淚 look forward to continuing and expanding my work on how our closest social relationships contribute to healthy aging, with the goal of developing socially informed interventions that prolong health in the face of challenges brought about by aging.鈥
The (SFARI) specializes in advancing the basic sciences of autism spectrum disorders. This year, the foundation is funding 10听recipients听through听SFARI听and听five through听SCPAB听to听support听early-career听scientists as they transition from postdoctoral research into an independent, tenure-track faculty position.
Kelly Martin, executive vice president of SFARI, expressed enthusiasm about welcoming this accomplished cohort of scientists into the Simons community: 鈥淭heir diverse expertise, including clinical insights and computational approaches, reflects the increasingly interdisciplinary nature of basic science, and we look forward to seeing all that they accomplish.鈥
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