NRI researcher receives the Janett Rosenberg Trubatch Career Development Award

Dr. Mingshan Xue, a Carolina DeLuca scholar and assistant professor in the Department of Neuroscience at Baylor College of Medicine and the Jan and Dan Duncan Neurological Research Institute at Texas Children's Hospital (NRI), has been awarded the Janett Rosenberg Trubatch Career Development Award. 

This award is conferred by the Society for Neuroscience, the world's largest professional organization of neuroscientists and physicians dedicated to understanding the brain and the nervous system, during their annual conference in October. It recognizes two early-career scientists for their originality and creativity in neuroscience research. 

Dr. Xue was chosen for the important contributions he has made to the study of cortical circuits. As a graduate student at Baylor College of Medicine, he demonstrated that a protein that regulates neurotransmitter release performs opposite functions in mammals and fruit fly models, highlighting the importance of species differences while also elucidating how this and other proteins are able to control neurotransmitter release. 

His current research focuses on the balance of excitatory and inhibitory signaling in the cortex, and how this balance is disrupted in neurological disorders like autism spectrum disorder and epilepsy.