Dr. Melissa Cooper earned her Bachelor of Science with Honors from Florida State University, double majoring in Biology and Psychology while competing as a Division 1 athlete in swimming. Dr. Cooper qualified for Olympic Trials, medaled at ACCs, and was a member of the All-ACC Swimming Team and the All-ACC Academic Team; concurrently, Melissa worked in Dr. Debra Fadool’s neuroscience laboratory, where she studied the impact of obesity on neuronal structure and function. In her Ph.D. work with Dr. David Calkins at Vanderbilt University, Dr. Cooper uncovered the remarkable plasticity of astrocyte networks and their protective functions in early neurodegenerative disease. For her postdoctoral work with Dr. Moses Chao at New York University, Dr. Cooper is determining how protective, neurotrophic astrocyte networks are activated. As a Leon Levy Fellow, she is using techniques from systems through molecular neuroscience to expand our knowledge on the neurotrophic capacity of astrocyte networks as well as on novel signaling molecules shared through astrocyte gap junctions.
