Dana Helmreich, PhD

Academic and Clinical Appointments

Assistant Professor of Psychiatry

Contact Information

Education

B.A. Franklin and Marshall College, 1987

Ph.D. Dept. of Behavioral Neuroscience, University of Pittsburgh, 1993

Professional Overview

Overall, Dr. Helmreich’s research goal is to determine how stressful stimuli impact an organism.  The lab pays particular attention to central nervous systems regulating endocrine systems, including the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis and the hypothalamic-pituitary thyroid axis.  Another central goal is determining how ‘psychological’ characteristics of stressors, such as controllability and coping, alter the impact of the stimulus on both neuroendocrine systems and the neuronal circuits underlying depressive and anxiety behaviors.

Selected Publications

Helmreich, D.L., Crouch, M., Dorr, N.P., and Parfitt, D.B. Peripheral triiodothyronine (T3) levels during escapable and inescapable footshock.  Physiology and Behavior, in press.

Helmreich, D.L, Parfitt, D.B., Lu, X-Y, Akil, H. and Watson, S.J. (2005) Relation between the hypothalamic-pituitary-thyroid (HPT) axis and the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis during repeated stress. Neuroendocrinology, 81,183-192.

Cordner, A.P., Herwood, M.B., Helmreich, D.L., and Parfitt, D.B. (2004) Antidepressants block the effects of inescapable stress on male reproductive behavior and corticotropin releasing hormone mRNA in the hypothalamic paraventricular nucleus of the Syrian hamster (Mesocricetus auratus), Journal of Neuroendocrinology, 16, 628-636.

Holmer, H.K., Rodman, J.E., Helmreich, D.L., & Parfitt, D.B. (2003) Differential effects of chronic escapable versus inescapable stress on male syrian hamster (Mesocricetus auratus) reproductive behavior. Hormones and Behavior, 43, 381-387.

Helmreich, D.L., Itoi, K.I., Lopez-Figueroa, M.O., Akil, H., & Watson, S.J. (2001) Norepinephrine- induced CRH and AVP gene transcription within the hypothalamus: Differential regulation by corticosterone.  Molecular Brain Research, 88, 62-73.

Itoi, K., Helmreich, D.L., Lopez-Figueroa, M.O., & Watson, S.J. (1999) Differential regulation of CRH and vasopressin gene transcription in the hypothalamus by norepinephrine. The Journal of Neuroscience, 19, 5464-5472.

Helmreich, D.L., Watkins, L.R., Deak, T., Maier, S.F., Akil, H., & Watson, S.J. (1999) The effect of stressor controllability on stress-induced neuropeptide mRNA expression within the paraventricular nucleus of the hypothalamus. Journal of Neuroendocrinology 11, 121-128.