Dr. Meucci and her former student Dr. Lindsay Festa collaborated with Dr. Gaskill and his former student Dr. Emily Nickoloff on a new review article discussing how HIV co-receptor signaling can contribute to HIV pathogenesis. The review article starts with a primer on HIV pathogenesis and the chemokine co-receptors that HIV uses to infect cells, […]
In a new review article published in Cellular and Molecular Life Sciences, Dr. Meucci’s group discusses clinical evidence of disrupted neuronal connectivity in HIV patients and the molecular mechanisms that drive neuronal dysfunction and cognitive impairment in HIV-associated neurocognitive disorders. The article is titled “Mechanisms of neuronal dysfunction in HIV-associated neurocognitive disorders” and is freely […]
Jared Luchetta was appointed as a National Research Service Award (NRSA) pre-doctoral fellow on Drexel University’s Interdisciplinary and Translational Research Training Grant in NeuroAIDS. The training grant is funded by the National Institute of Mental Health as part of a long-standing collaboration between Drexel and Temple University investigators. Congratulations Jared!
The Meucci lab published a book chapter on known and potential mechanisms by which µ-opioid agonists regulate neuronal iron homeostasis, a new finding that has implications for HIV-associated neurocognitive disorders and other neurological disorders. The chapter expands on previous work from our lab showing that morphine regulates iron storage in endolysosomes, and this leads to […]
In collaboration with 15 researchers, Dr. Meucci contributed to a viewpoint article on how coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) could be linked to Parkinson’s disease and Parkinsonism. The article discusses current knowledge and potential mechanisms by which SARS-CoV-2 may establish an infection in the brain, how brain infection might lead to clinical manifestations of Parkinsonism, and […]
The Meucci lab recently published a new study suggesting that learning and memory problems in patients with HIV-associated neurocognitive disorders (HAND) may be reversible. Using an animal model of HAND, Dr. Lindsay Festa and colleagues showed that treatment with the chemokine CXCL12 improved cognitive flexibility in a set-shifting task and increased dendritic spine density in […]
DUniBo, the new collaboration between Drexel University and the University of Bologna, Italy – led by Dr. Olimpia Meucci (DUCOM) and Dr. Renato Brandimarti (UniBo) – received funding from the University of Bologna to launch its first exchange project titled ‘The outlooking scientist’. The grant supports a visit of four graduate students (two from each […]
Bradley Nash and Olimpia Meucci recently published an article on the Society for Neuroscience website Neuronline breaking down the Meucci lab’s latest research on opioid regulation of neuronal iron metabolism. The article discusses why the lab was looking into opioids effects on iron, the results of our most recent study, and how the insights gained […]
Congratulations to Dr. Meucci, who has been elected as a 2019 fellow of the National Academy of Inventors (NAI)! Each year, the NAI elects a class of academic fellows whose innovations and inventions have made a positive impact on society. The NAI fellow is the highest level of distinction for academic inventors, developed to both […]
The Meucci lab published a new review article that outlines the interplay between chemokine and opioid signaling and how these systems may regulate synaptodendritic damage in HIV-associated neurocognitive disorders (HAND). The article begins with a brief discussion of synaptodendritic damage in HAND and presents a small study on region-specific synaptic damage in two animal models […]