July 2023
Students Jose Pena(25′), Laura Betances (25′), and Yamilet Nieves (26′) presented two posters at the annual RI-INBRE SURF Conference.
May 2023
Rachael Layden, Chris Walsh, and Shelby Bawden graduate from PC with too many majors, magnum cum laude’s, certificates, and honors to list. Rachael is working as a Research Assistant at Boston University working on neuropsychological research with patients with CTE and Alzheimer’s Disease. Chris is pursuing a nursing degree at MGH. Shelby is working as a Research Assistant at the Memory and Aging Center at Butler Hospital. We are so proud of them but so sad to see them leave!
April 2023
Lab alumni Brittany Hemmer ’17 receives a very competitive F31 award from the NIH for her research on microglia in Dr. Castellano’s research laboratory at Mt. Sinai Hospital!
Brittany Hemmer, ’17, and Alexandra Fischbach, ’17 wow the Neuroscience Certificate senior cohort with the fascinating research they are pursuing in their doctoral work. They catch up with their old professor over dinner!
The whole NAC lab presents our original research at the Annual Celebration of Student Scholarship.
Students Chris Walsh (’23), Rachael Layden (’23), Shelby Bawden (’23), and Jose Pena (’25) presented two posters at the International Comparative Cognition Society Conference in Melbourne, FL.
August 2022
Lab Alumni Taylor Wise is awarded the very prestigious F99 K-00 Award from NIH! Her project examines sociality and the posterior parietal cortex and is part of an ongoing collaboration with the NAC lab.
July 2022
Students Chris Walsh (’23), Rachael Layden (’23), Shelby Bawden (’23), and Jose Pena (’25) presented at the RI-INBRE SURF Conference after an intense summer of data collection (that didn’t stop in May or August!)
January-June 2022
It’s a busy spring and summer of data collection with three projects going on! Feels good to be back in the lab doing research after two summers of the pandemic holding us back!
May 2022
Congrats to Colin Call (’22) and Allie Eurell (’22) who graduated with dual majors, honors, Neuroscience Certificate students, and valuable members of the NAC lab. We are so sad to see them go, but are so proud of them and their new positions!
April 2022
Lab member, Shelby Bawden (’23) is awarded the competitive Undergraduate Research Summer Fellowship through the Center for Engaged Learning to complete research in the NAC lab over the summer. She will lead our project examining transitive inference in rats!
Dr. Templer receives the Outstanding Faculty Scholar Award.
February 2022
Lab hats! More lab hangouts, making up for lost time during the height of the pandemic.
September 2021
Fun lab get-togethers were difficult because of the pandemic, but we finally share some time together maskless at Dr. Templers!
August 2021
Annie Dankert (’21) starts in the Thiele Lab at UNC Chapel Hill, pursuing her Ph.D. in Neuroscience!
May 2021
Carina Alessandro (’21) and Annie Dankert (’21) graduate and it’s a bittersweet moment for Dr. Templer and the NAC lab. We are so proud of them and their next steps but will miss them!
October 2020
Pandemic-style lab meetings!
May 2020
Robert Vera (’20) graduates! Sadly, the pandemic prevented a celebration but in Fall 2021 Dr. Templer was able to celebrate Robert’s successes with his family when they came back for a graduation ceremony. Robert joins UPenn as a Research Assistant.
April 2020
Students Carina Alessandro (’21), Colin Call (’22), and Robert Vera (’20) present their research virtually at Providence College’s 11th Annual Celebration of Student Scholarship and Creativity due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
September 2019
Students Annie Dankert (’21), Colin Call (’22), and Carina Alessandro (’21) presented their summer 2019 research posters as the Sigma Xi Research Honor Society poster session at Providence College.
August 2019
Congratulations to Annie Dankert ’21 for winning Best Poster in the Systems/Neuroscience category at the Summer Neuroscience Internship Program (SNIP) final conference at the University of Florida! Annie was in charge of a project on the impact of long-term social housing on biconditional association task performance and neuron ensembles in the anterior cingulate cortex and the CA3 subregion of the hippocampus. She used catFISH to label expression or the immediate early genes arc and Homer which can be used to assess neuronal activity.
This summer students at PC learned new skills and did some great research on the rat Posterior Parietal Cortex, as well as getting in some great lab bonding! Undergrads Robert Vera ’20, Carina Alessandro ’21, and Colin Call ’22 learned new histology skills in mounting brain sections for quantification of cell damage, as well as taking a ride down the East Bay bike path in RI, and enjoying a lab dinner getting pizza.
July 2019
The NAC Lab attended the RI-INBRE SURF end-of-summer research conference on July 26th, presenting our poster “Creating Permanent Lesions and Temporary Inactivations in the Rat Posterior Parietal Cortex”. Undergrads Robert Vera ’20, Carina Alessandro ’21, and Colin Call ’22 did a great job presenting their summer research to students and other researchers across many scientific fields of study. You can find a copy of the poster here.
June 2019
Undergraduates Robert Vera ’20, Annie Dankert ’21, Carina Alessandro ’21, and Colin Call ’22, join the NAC Lab for the summer thanks to funding from the NIH via RI-INBRE.
Annie will be at the University of Florida working with Dr. Sara Burke and Dr. Abbi Hernandez, researching cognitive decline due to aging, while Robert, Carina, and Colin will be continuing our work at PC to understand the role the PPC plays in the rat brain.
May 2019
Emma Halter joins the NAC Lab as the new lab manager! You can check out her bio on the people page.
Katrina and Judith Dayay (’21) graduate with Psychology and Biology Majors and members of the Neuroscience Program. Congratulations to Katrina and Judith on their graduation and acceptance to the doctoral program in clinical psychology at William James College! Read more about why they are so awesome here.
April 2019
The NAC Lab presented two talks and several posters and this years Comparative Cognition Conference in Melbourne, FL.
Congratulations to Katrina and Judith Dayaw on their graduation and acceptance to the PhD Clinical Psychology program at William James College! Read about their research and plans for next year here.
Congratulations to Keith Lee ’18 on his acceptance to the Philadelphia College of Osteopathic Medicine!
Congratulations to Brittany Hemmer ’17 on her acceptance to the doctoral program in Neuroscience at Mt. Sinai!
Congratulations to our Lab Manager Dominique Martin on her acceptance to the doctoral program in Animal Science at the University of Connecticut!
July 2018
Dominique Martin joins the NAC Lab as the new laboratory manager! You can check out her bio on the people page.
June 2018
Instagram worthy…
Check out our undergrad Katrina Dayaw and her #PCresearch takeover on PC’s instagram page, friargram! Here’s a preview of what summer lab meetings look like…
May 2018
Our post-doctorate, Victoria, is moving on to be a professor!
We’d like to congratulate Dr. Heimer-McGinn on accepting a tenure-track position at Roger Williams University in Bristol, RI! There she will be teaching the next generation of students about neuroscience and psychology while also building Rhode Island’s growing network of scientists. The NAC lab wishes her all the best!
Our lab manager, Taylor, has been admitted to a PhD program!
Taylor will be starting her PhD this fall at Brown University! There she will continue studying many of the topics addressed in the NAC Lab and is sure to keep a lasting connection with us and our research. Congratulations and good luck!
April 2018
The NAC lab is looking to hire a new laboratory manager!
The NAC lab invites applications for a Research Associate Position funded by NIH via RI-INBRE to begin approx. July 1, 2018. The Research Associate will serve as laboratory manager for the NAC lab, and through a collaborative grant with Dr. Rebecca Burwell, conduct research at Brown University. Successful applicants should hold a B.A. or B.S. in Psychology, Biology, Neuroscience, or a related field. M.A. applicants are also strongly encouraged to apply.
If you’d like to learn more on the position and our research, please contact Dr. Templer for more information.
March 2018
RI-INBRE is helping the NAC Lab conduct great research!
Rhode Island IDeA Network for Excellence in Biomedical Research (RI-INBRE) has supported our work here in the NAC lab for several years now. With their backing, we have been able to conduct research year-round! Here is the NAC lab grabbing a quick photo with our newly-installed plaque that is proudly displayed outside of the laboratory.
NAC lab helps students learn about the brain…
As part of Brain Week Rhode Island, members of the NAC lab volunteered with educators from Brown University to show young students the wonders of the brain. One of our members, Katrina, is shown here helping students learn human brain anatomy.
September 2017
The NAC Lab would like to welcome Dr. Victoria Heimer-McGinn as our new post-doctorate! Check out our People page to read more on Dr. Heimer-McGinn.
July 2017
Read about the NAC lab in the news: NPR, July, 2017; New Scientist, July, 2017
RI-INBRE SURF conference
Lab funday 🙂
May 2017
Congrats to Alex, Brittany, and Celia on completing their B.S.s and getting awesome jobs!
April 2017
The NAC Lab enjoying some sunshine between presentations at this year’s CO3 conference in Florida! Together we presented two posters and one talk on some of our recent findings.
October 2016
Congrats to Keith, Brittany, and Judith on receiving an Undergraduate Research Award for their aging study!
September 2016
Four of our students present at the Biology Department’s Sigma Xi Conference at PC!
Normal days in the lab…Brittany hard at work on the cryostat and Keith testing rats on the Radial Arm Maze.
July 2016
Our five summer students presented their independent projects at the Rhode Island Summer Undergraduate Research Fellow (SURF) Conference. Their projects included topics such as metacognition, sociability, dominance hierarchies, “grit”, and working memory.
June 2016
The NAC lab is excited to welcome our second-ever lab manager, Taylor Wise! See our “People” tab to learn more on Taylor and what projects she is involved in.
May 2016
Congrats to Sam on completing his B.A. and congrats to Aidan on completing his B.S. The NAC lab will miss its founding members and we wish them luck in their graduate programs!
April 2016
Showing off our new NAC Lab shirts at the last lab meeting of the spring semester! We had a great year in the lab.
Four of our undergrads represented Providence College and the NAC Lab in April at the 23rd International Conference on Comparative Cognition (CO3) in Melbourne, Florida. Aidan and Keith presented a poster on their metamemory research, and Lindsay and Brittany presented a poster on their social dominance research!
October, 2015
After a few weeks of hard work and lots of research, the NAC Lab took a mid-semester break and went out for some delicious pizza in Providence.
September, 2015
The NAC Lab family got together for some cleaning and scrubbing of the lab. Here’s a shot of four of our students posing mid-clean!
We are happy to welcome two new students to our lab, Melissa and Keith!
August, 2015
NAC Lab welcomes our first-ever lab manager, Kristen Palframan. We’re excited for a great year of research ahead of us!
July, 2015
At the NAC Lab’s first URI SURF Conference, Sam and Aidan present their research on metamemory and Alex and Brittany present their research on social behavior!
Aidan receives the highly competitive Providence College Summer Undergraduate Research Grant for his project, Metamemory in the Rat, so he can continue to conduct research over the summer!
February, 2015
Dr. Templer comments on an article on animal memory in National Geographic
Neuroscience & Animal Cognition 