Alexxai Kravitz
Associate Professor of Psychiatry
- Phone: 314-273-7956
- Email: alexxai@nospam.wustl.edu
Additional Titles & Roles
- Interim Division Director for Basic Neuroscience
- Associate Professor of Neuroscience
- Associate Professor of Anesthesiology
Education & Training
- B.A.: Wesleyan University, 2019
- Ph.D.: University of Pennsylvania, 2019
Research Interests
Dr. Kravitz is interested in the study of basal ganglia circuits and how their function changes in disease states such as obesity, addiction, and anxiety disorders. Under normal conditions, the basal ganglia drives animals toward the selection of adaptive behavioral outcomes. Learning can bias this selection process toward specific behavior by altering synapses within and outside the basal ganglia. Unfortunately, these same synaptic alterations can be hijacked by disease, resulting in unhealthy behavioral outputs, such as in obesity and drug addiction. Using high throughput behavioral testing, optogenetics, and electrical and optical brain recordings, the Kravitz lab characterizes changes in behavior in animal models of disease, and attempts to understand the neural correlates and causes of these changes.
Recent Publications
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MouseVUER: video based open-source system for laboratory mouse home-cage monitoring
Salem, G., Cope, N., Garmendia, M., Pu, A., Somenhalli, A., Krynitsky, J., Cubert, N., Jones, T., Dold, G., Fletcher, A., Kravitz, A., Pohida, T. & Dennis, J., Dec 2024, In: Scientific reports. 14, 1, 2662.
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Diet-Induced Obesity Induces Transcriptomic Changes in Neuroimmunometabolic-Related Genes in the Striatum and Olfactory Bulb
Jaime-Lara, R. B., Colina-Prisco, C., De Jesus Vega, M., Williams, S., Usdin, T., Matikainen-Ankney, B., Kinkead, A., Brooks, B., Wang, Y., Franks, A. T., Kravitz, A. & Joseph, P. V., Sep 2024, In: International journal of molecular sciences. 25, 17, 9330.
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Glutamatergic supramammillary nucleus neurons respond to threatening stressors and promote active coping
Escobedo, A., Holloway, S. A., Votoupal, M., Cone, A. L., Skelton, H., Legaria, A. A., Ndiokho, I., Floyd, T., Kravitz, A. V., Bruchas, M. R. & Norris, A. J., Jun 3 2024, In: eLife. 12
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Airy-beam holographic sonogenetics for advancing neuromodulation precision and flexibility
Hu, Z., Yang, Y., Yang, L., Gong, Y., Chukwu, C., Ye, D., Yue, Y., Yuan, J., Kravitz, A. V. & Chen, H., Jun 1 2024, In: Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America. 121, 26, e2402200121.
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TMEM135 links peroxisomes to the regulation of brown fat mitochondrial fission and energy homeostasis
Hu, D., Tan, M., Lu, D., Kleiboeker, B., Liu, X., Park, H., Kravitz, A. V., Shoghi, K. I., Tseng, Y. H., Razani, B., Ikeda, A. & Lodhi, I. J., Dec 2023, In: Nature communications. 14, 1, 6099.