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Lauren Atlas

@laurenatlas.bsky.social

2.5K followers 600 following 51 posts

Personal account / opinions are my own. Senior Investigator, Affective Neuroscience & Pain. (She/her)

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Lauren Atlas @laurenatlas.bsky.social · Jul 31

Almost missed that this is out! Former postdoc Liz Necka led this long overdue FMRI study formally comparing two types of pain modulation: Placebo analgesia & predictive cues. TLDR: these are NOT the same! Placebo analgesia reduced cue effects, & brain mechanisms were nearly all dissociable. 1/4

SfN Journals @sfnjournals.bsky.social · Jul 28

New in #JNeurosci from Necka et al: External cues and treatments shape expectations about pain in different ways, and their mechanisms distinctly influence how people experience pain. https://doi.org/10.1523/JNEUROSCI.0050-25.2025

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Tibor Rohacs @rohacstibor.bsky.social · 1d

The Rutgers Brain Health Institute @rutgersbhi.bsky.social is looking for an accomplished scientist to serve as the Director of the new Rutgers Center on Research in Pain and Pain Therapeutics. Feel free re-post and/or reach out to me if you have any questions
jobs.rutgers.edu/postings/225...

Director of Center on Research in Pain and Pain Therapeutics at Rutgers Brain Health Institute

We seek an accomplished scientist, at the Professor or Associate Professor level, to join the Rutgers Brain Health Institute (BHI) and The Rutgers School of Dental Medicine (RSDM) as Director of the n...

jobs.rutgers.edu

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Lauren Atlas @laurenatlas.bsky.social · 6d

Maybe. But the fight IS for brain surgery, rocket surgery, and climate science.

Lauren Atlas @laurenatlas.bsky.social · 6d

I mean, technically, it also impacts rocket science, brain surgery, and solving the climate crisis...

Colette Delawalla @cdelawalla.bsky.social · 6d

Listen, I PROMISE YOU this is a winnable fight.

This isn’t rocket science, it’s not brain surgery, it’s not solving the climate crisis.

The answer is simple: All we have to do is stand up TOGETHER and say “no, we don’t do that in America”.

If we fight, we will win.

Ron Filipkowski @ronfilipkowski.bsky.social · 6d

Posted by the President of the United States.

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Drug Monkey @drugmonkey.bsky.social · 7d

More NIH chaos.

NICHD, NIMHD and NIAID Directors are all dismissed.

Princess Vimentin PhD | Cancer Biologist @princess-vimentin.bsky.social · 7d

Jeanne Marrazzo, director of NIAID, claimed that the Trump Administration’s actions
endangered research subjects, defied court orders & undermined vaccine research.

Earlier, Kennedy fired Susan Monarez of the CDC.

Resisting unethical policies costs you.

🧪🎁🔗
www.nytimes.com/2025/10/02/h...

Kennedy Fires N.I.H. Scientist Who Filed Whistle-Blower Complaint

www.nytimes.com

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Lauren Atlas @laurenatlas.bsky.social · 6d

I was wondering how my feed had nothing about the shutdown. You guys know this means no grants, study sections, etc….

Mark Baxter 🏳️‍🌈🧂 @markgbaxter.bsky.social · 7d

infuriated that the Republican government shutdown is, among other things, interfering with upcoming grant reviews 😡

Reposted by Lauren Atlas

Nicole Rust @nicolecrust.bsky.social · 13d

Save the date 📆. On Oct 22/23, @nationalacademies.org will hold a stellar virtual workshop on brain/body interations (open to all).

www.nationalacademies.org/en/our-work/...

Title: Understanding Brain-Body Interactions to Advance Brain Health: A Workshop. Photo: picture of a transparent person with brain and nervous system illuminated.

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Neuromatch @neuromatch.bsky.social · 14d

Exciting news! 🎉 Our Computational Neuroscience course has been awarded NIH BRAIN Initiative funding! Students will get hands-on experience w real BRAIN Initiative datasets, helping them build computational skills that are essential for the future of neuroscience.

www.linkedin.com/feed/update/...

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The Transmitter @thetransmitter.bsky.social · 14d

A method for capturing neuronal activity using fMRI excited the neuroimaging field but couldn’t be replicated. Today, the authors of the original paper retracted their work.

By @callimcflurry.bsky.social

#neuroskyence

www.thetransmitter.org/retraction/a...

Authors retract Science paper on controversial fMRI method

Several MRI artifacts contribute to the neuronal activity signal picked up by the method, according to a preprint the authors posted this month.

www.thetransmitter.org

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Biological Psychiatry @biologicalpsych.bsky.social · 14d

The Biological Psychiatry family of journals is now officially on Bluesky!

Follow us for the latest research in psychiatric neuroscience, cognitive neuroimaging, and global open science from our three leading journals.

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Ondrej Zika @ondrejzika.bsky.social · 15d

🚨 I am over the moon 🌓 to announce that I am joining University College Dublin @ucddublin.bsky.social as an Assistant Professor this fall to start the Uncertain Mind (UMI) lab 💫

I am looking for PhD/Postdoc candidates to join (more below 👇 ). Please RT as the deadline is pretty soon 🙏

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Vinny Costa @vincentcostaphd.bsky.social · 22d

Hot take #3: “BLA subdivisions contain specific subtypes of excitatory and inhibitory neurons.

Hot take #4: Genes downregulated in PTSD load mainly onto specific subtypes of inhibitory interneurons that are highly conserved across primates.

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Vinny Costa @vincentcostaphd.bsky.social · 22d

Hot take #1: Amygdala neuron types are highly conserved across different primate species. No human specific innovations.

Hot take #2: Canonical gene markers identified for murine amygdala neuron types are not especially informative inferring cell type identifies for the primate amygdala.

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Vinny Costa @vincentcostaphd.bsky.social · 22d

A spatially resolved transcriptomic atlas of the primate amygdala (human, macaque, and baboon) now out in Science Advances (www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...). The amygdala contains 32 types of neurons with many neuron types specific to particular subdivisions.

Lots of updates from the preprint!

Transcriptomic diversity of amygdalar subdivisions across humans and nonhuman primates

Specialized cell types and links to psychiatric disorders are revealed by genetic mapping of primate amygdala neurons.

www.science.org

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Hilary Barth @hilarybarth.bsky.social · 22d

We’re searching for TWO tenure-track cognitive neuroscientists here in the Wesleyan University Psychology Department! Apply here wesleyan.wd5.myworkdayjobs.com/careers

Careers at Wesleyan

We welcome your interest in Wesleyan’s diverse, energetic community of employees who, by their creativity, innovative thinking, and generosity of spirit, help make Wesleyan a great place to work. In t...

wesleyan.wd5.myworkdayjobs.com

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Martin Wiener @martinwiener.bsky.social · 23d

WE ARE HIRING!!

Official posting coming soon for a tenure track assistant professor job in Psychology at George Mason University. Focus on Computational Cognitive Neuroscience and AI.

I’m chairing the search committee, so DMs and emails welcome.

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Brokoslaw Laschowski @drlaschowski.bsky.social · Sep 5

Come join us at University of Toronto. We're hiring a Professor of computational cognitive neuroscience.

#neuroAI #compneuro jobs.utoronto.ca/job/Toronto-...

Professor - Computational Cognitive Neuroscience

jobs.utoronto.ca

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Heejung Jung @jungheejung.bsky.social · Sep 4

New Open dataset alert:
🧠 Introducing "Spacetop" – a massive multimodal fMRI dataset that bridges naturalistic and experimental neuroscience!

N = 101 x 6 hours each = 606 functional iso-hours combining movies, pain, faces, theory-of-mind and other cognitive tasks!

🧵below

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Lauren Atlas @laurenatlas.bsky.social · Sep 4

Wow what a rich dataset! Amazing work @jungheejung.bsky.social !

Heejung Jung @jungheejung.bsky.social · Sep 4

[7/7] 🚀 Sharing this to collaboratively advance naturalistic, cognitive, pain, & affective neuroscience!

Huge thanks to all amazing co-authors who made this possible!

Paper: rdcu.be/eBTy2
@ScientificData

Dataset: openneuro.org/datasets/ds0...

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Heejung Jung @jungheejung.bsky.social · Sep 4

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Lauren Atlas @laurenatlas.bsky.social · Sep 3

So sad about this news. Nina has been a powerful advocate and leader for the intramural program and it’s painful to imagine it without her. Very grateful for all she has done as DDIR!

Jeremy Berg @jeremymberg.bsky.social · Sep 3

Hearing from multiple sources that Nina Schor, MD, PhD is stepping down as Deputy Director for Intramural Research at NIH at the end of September.

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Sam McDougle @actlab.bsky.social · Sep 3

📣 🚨 Yale Psychology has 3 searches this year!

Links below:

Quantitative link: apply.interfolio.com/171903
Social link: apply.interfolio.com/171989
Clinical link: apply.interfolio.com/171970

Apply - Interfolio {{$ctrl.$state.data.pageTitle}} - Apply - Interfolio

apply.interfolio.com

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Mark Histed @markhisted.org · Sep 3

I've heard from several scientists who are scandalized because NIH people now cannot buy anything (!!) betw mid-Aug and Oct 1.

Except that's been the case for decades. It's because appropriated funds expire at the end of the fiscal year, so there's an extremely complex process to close out the yr.

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Massi(e)h Moayedi — مسیح مویدی @massih.bsky.social · Sep 2

I really enjoyed working on this with @laurenatlas.bsky.social. The editor was also amazing to work with. I learned a lot along the way.

Stay tuned for more work from @laurenatlas.bsky.social, David Finn and me.

Lauren Atlas @laurenatlas.bsky.social · Aug 28

Thanks to @massih.bsky.social for inviting me to co-author this commentary @science.org Mapping the anatomy of placebo analgesia | Science www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

Mapping the anatomy of placebo analgesia

The identification of somatotopy in brainstem pain modulatory pathways could help treat chronic pain

www.science.org

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Dr. David Miller 🏳️‍🌈 @davidimiller.bsky.social · Sep 1

🧪 And House appropriators say: no cuts to NIH budget!

House subcommittee version just came out (link below). Holds NIH flat at $48 billion.

To be clear: this is far from over. But a good sign that science still matters across both sides of aisle.

YOUR VOICE MATTERS!!

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Atul Gawande @agawande.bsky.social · Sep 1

9 CDC Directors going back to 1977 speak out. What RFK Jr has done to our nation’s public health system "should alarm every American."

It "is unlike anything we have ever seen at the agency, and unlike anything our country has ever experienced." www.nytimes.com/2025/09/01/o...

Opinion | We Ran the C.D.C.: Kennedy Is Endangering Every American’s Health

www.nytimes.com

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