Neurosciences Seminar

February 29, 2024

Stephen D. Meriney, PhD
Professor and Chairman, Neuroscience; Professor of Psychiatry, University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, PA

"A positive allosteric gating modifier of Cav2 voltage-gated calcium channels with therapeutic potential to treat a variety of neuromuscular diseases"

 Host: Dr. Ashley Nemes-Baran

Bio: Dr. Meriney received his undergraduate degree in Zoology at the University of New Hampshire studying marine animals. He then went on to receive his PhD from the University of Connecticut studying physiology with a focus on neuroscience. This was followed by postdoctoral work at UCLA studying neuromuscular synapses. Since the start of his postdoctoral work in 1987, Dr. Meriney has studied neuromuscular physiology and ion channel function in a variety of neuromuscular model systems, including several neuromuscular diseases and disorders (including Lambert-Eaton myasthenic syndrome, ALS, SMA, and frailty in aging). After joining the University of Pittsburgh faculty in 1993, he developed a research program centered on voltage-gated calcium channels, synaptic physiology and modulation, neuromuscular diseases, and the development of novel calcium channel gating modifiers as potential therapeutics for neuromuscular diseases. Dr. Meriney has a long record of mentoring postdoctoral fellows (including Dr. Robert Poage), graduate students and undergraduate research fellows, and his research has been funded by the NIH, NSF, and the Muscular Dystrophy Association. He is currently Professor and Chair of the Department of Neuroscience, and the co-director of the Center for Neuroscience at the University of Pittsburgh.

Reference Publication: Tarr, T. B., et al., (2014). Complete reversal of Lambert–Eaton myasthenic syndrome synaptic impairment by the combined use of a K+ channel blocker and a Ca2+ channel agonist. In The Journal of Physiology (Vol. 592, Issue 16, pp. 3687–3696). Wiley. https://doi.org/10.1113/jphysiol.2014.27649333