Enhancing Neuroscientific Discovery Through Diverse Communities

Gina Poe is a neuroscientist and a professor in the department of integrative biology and physiology, and the department of psychiatry and biobehavioral sciences at the University of California, Los Angeles and is on the executive committee to UCLA’s Brain Research Institute. Poe’s lab research is dedicated to the study of the role of sleep for learning and memory consolidation, including the mechanisms that fail that process in mental disorders. She graduated with a BA in human biology from Stanford University then entered the UCLA Neuroscience Interdepartmental Program (NSIDP) where she was appointed as a predoctoral trainees on a Basic Sleep training program.

Julio J. Ramirez, PhD, is the R. Stuart Dickson Professor and director of the neuroscience program at Davidson College. Ramriez earned his bachelor's degree in psychology from Fairfield University and later obtained his PhD in psychology from Clark University. After teaching at the College of St. Benedict/St. John's University, Rameriez completed his postdoctorate in neuroscience at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Ramirez's research interests include the recovery of function after central nervous system injury, with an emphasis on determining the functional significance of hippocampal neuroplasticity. At the Society for Neuroscience (SfN), Ramirez was co-director of the Neuroscience Scholars Program from 2012 to 2021 and served as a counselor and treasurer of SfN from 2015 to 2023. He is currently the chair of SfN’s Neuroscience Training Committee.

Lisa M. Savage is a professor and chair of psychology at Binghamton University, State University of New York. Savage is a member of the Ojibwa Nation. She received her PhD from the University of Minnesota and did her postdoctoral fellowship at the Veterans Affairs Medical Center in San Diego. Beyond her NIAAA funded research program (NADIA and DEARC) that investigates alcohol-related brain and behavioral dysfunction, she has been committed to training the next generation of underrepresented students (PI on SUNY Upstate Bridges Program).