Current Lab Members
Donna L. Maney
Principal Investigator
Dr. Maney received her PhD in Neurobiology & Behavior from the University of Washington in 1997 and did her postdoctoral work at Johns Hopkins University. She has been at Emory since 2002.
Postdoctoral Fellow
Nicole received her PhD from Cornell University, where she focused the neuroendocrine control of reproductive strategies in birds. She then completed a postdoctoral fellowship at Ga Tech, where she investigated the neural and genomic basis of complex social behaviors of African cichlid fish. In our lab, Nicole is analyzing a previously understudied chromosomal rearrangement in white-throated sparrows.
Isabel Fraccaroli
Research Specialist
Isabel has an undergraduate degree in Biology from the University of Ferrara, Italy. She has worked with bumblebees, rats, mice, lizards, and of course, birds. She will soon complete her masters thesis in Biomolecular Sciences and Evolution. In our lab, she contributes to every project and makes sure everything runs smoothly.
Jennifer Merritt
Graduate Fellow
Jenny graduated from the University of Illinois with a B.S. in Psychology and a minor in Integrative Biology. In our lab, she's applying her solid background in behavioral genetics to understand how small changes in gene sequence can have large effects on behavioral phenotypes.
Natalie Pilgeram
Graduate Fellow
Natalie earned her bachelor's degree at Tulane. Before coming to Emory, she studied the neurobiology of memory, sleep, and aging in mouse models. She's also worked with human subjects in the field of social psychology. For her master's thesis at Emory, she explored how oxytocin shapes vocal development in songbirds. Starting in 2020, she will focus on social reward in rhesus macaques in Jocelyne Bachevalier's lab.
Kenzie Prichard
Graduate Fellow
Kenzie graduated from the University of Montana in 2017. In her honors thesis there, she looked at how stress hormones affect parental behavior in tree swallows. She has also worked with woodpeckers and wolverines. Her field experience includes projects in South Africa and Tanzania. In our lab she is interested in the evolution of behavior and its neuroendocrine control.
