Alexis Oppman

Background

About Alexis Oppman

I am an incoming first-year dental student at the University of Iowa College of Dentistry. In my current roles as a research assistant in Dr. Nandakumar Narayanan's lab, I study cortical dopamine neurons and their roles in cognition. We use two cognitive tasks, the interval timing and working memory task, to study mouse behavior and executive function. We leverage a variety of surgical and viral tools to manipulate neurons of interest and observe its influence on cognitive performance, drawing inferences from both broad animal behavioral analysis and precise single-neuron physiology. I have a Bachelor of Science in Biomedical Sciences from the same university, where I also conducted an independent research project on hypertrophic cardiomyopathy as an undergraduate research assistant. My research interests and skills include stereotaxic surgery, scoping studies, and dissection. I have presented my key findings and proposed applications at the Society for Neuroscience and Experimental Biology conferences. I am passionate about advancing the understanding of the neural mechanisms underlying cognition and behavior, and how they can be modulated or improved. I value collaboration, innovation, and diversity in research, and I seek to contribute to a team that shares these values and goals.