Kurt Fraser
@kurtfraser.bsky.social
📤 2521
📥 652
📝 1351
Brain scientist, tall human, dog owner in the twin cities
reposted by
Kurt Fraser
Lindsay Schwarz
about 18 hours ago
thrilled to share our latest work from the lab, led by the amazing
@fernandezpenac.bsky.social
(now a PI at
@unmc.bsky.social
!) where we found a new role for a tiny group of adrenergic neurons in RVLM, the C1 cells.
www.cell.com/neuron/fullt...
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Kurt Fraser
Lex Kravitz
about 13 hours ago
I am happy to share our latest manuscript, led by newly-minted PhD Justin Wang, identifying a neural population that selectively controls hedonic, but not homeostatic, feeding.
www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...
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Ventral pallidal GABAergic neurons control hedonic feeding and obesity
Food intake is governed by two interacting drives. The homeostatic hunger drive regulates food intake to fulfill caloric needs while the hedonic drive promotes intake of palatable foods outside of cal...
https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.64898/2026.06.18.733195v1
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Kurt Fraser
bioRxiv Neuroscience
1 day ago
Basal forebrain projections to the lateral habenula sex-dependently regulate ethanol and sucrose consumption
https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.64898/2026.07.02.736151v1
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Levi just found out today is secretly a Friday
8 days ago
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Kurt Fraser
bioRxiv Neuroscience
9 days ago
Headbutting goats self-inflict traumatic brain injury
https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.64898/2026.06.26.734585v1
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Levi decided to start his work day at 130 PM is that okay with yall?
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9 days ago
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Could AI do this
10 days ago
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Albino squirrel in my yard this morning. Is that a blessing or an omen?
14 days ago
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Kurt Fraser
bioRxiv Neuroscience
15 days ago
Sensor sensibility: Divergent measurements of dopaminergic signaling to acute morphine administration via fiber photometry
https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.64898/2026.06.19.733408v1
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forgot the point of this all was to rank papers
16 days ago
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Kurt Fraser
Alicia Izquierdo
17 days ago
New paper alert! Claudia Aguirre and
@jaehyungwoo.bsky.social
characterized “lapse rates,” or deviations from the better reward strategy, both prior to and following reversals. Females are interesting…
academic.oup.com/oons/article...
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Jane's Brilliant Strategy in Grease
ALT: Jane's Brilliant Strategy in Grease
https://static.klipy.com/ii/c3a19a0b747a76e98651f2b9a3cca5ff/b0/a8/ON35BTWO.gif?hh=497&ww=498&mp4=Fl8cwxiHZixa&webm=Oc6rwe7STRCqhL3IjTM
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reposted by
Kurt Fraser
Neuropsychopharmacology
18 days ago
Glewwe et al. demonstrate that female mice outperform males in a touchscreen set-shifting task, suggesting that stable choice commitment in females paradoxically enhances cognitive flexibility
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Sex-biased computations underlying differential set shift performance in mice
Neuropsychopharmacology - Sex-biased computations underlying differential set shift performance in mice
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41386-026-02397-z
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reposted by
Kurt Fraser
I'm looking to hire a research technician/lab manager. This role is ideal for someone looking to gain experience and independence after undergraduate research on their way to graduate school. Please encourage anyone interested to apply:
hr.myu.umn.edu/jobs/ext/374...
(job code 374183)
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Careers
The Fraser Lab at the University of Minnesota (https://fraserlab.psych.umn.edu/) is recruiting a full-time research technician to support the lab. As a part of the Department of Psychology we are involved in the greater neuroscience research community at the University of Minnesota which provides excellent access to training and professional development. The Fraser Lab is interested in the neurobiological basis of motivated behavior and investigates how defined brain circuits contribute to behavioral regulation. We make use of modern neuroscience approaches to record and manipulate neural activity in real-time as rodents perform complex behavioral tasks to relate precise aspects of neural activity to well-defined psychological processes. To do so, we regularly use optogenetics, chemogenetics, calcium imaging, biosensors, pharmacology, and immunohistochemistry. Our ultimate goal is to decipher the neural mechanisms regulating behavior and to characterize how these are altered in psychiatric illness, such as addiction, or by differences in lived experience, such as after early life adversity, to potentially identify novel therapeutics. We seek a team member who can play a lead role in lab operations, collaborate closely with the PI, and engage in team-building and growth.Duties:Laboratory logistics, maintenance and operations (30%):
https://hr.myu.umn.edu/jobs/ext/374183
22 days ago
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reposted by
Kurt Fraser
Mari Sosa
18 days ago
Grateful to featured as a new PI by
@thetransmitter.bsky.social
!
www.thetransmitter.org/liftoff-new-...
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Liftoff: New lab alerts
Learn about early-career scientists starting their own labs.
https://www.thetransmitter.org/liftoff-new-lab-alerts-early-career-neuroscientists/
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reposted by
Kurt Fraser
Mondo Mascots
18 days ago
Pushpush, a shapeshifting blob-like white character, appears in Synapusyu, a TV show made for babies to strengthen their synapses.
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It’s Sunday
19 days ago
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Kurt Fraser
Ben Saunders
21 days ago
Check our new work! Studies led brilliantly by
@louisakuper.bsky.social
. We investigate the parafascicular thalamus as an interface of sensory, attention, and movement signals that guide exploration and cue-related learning.
add a skeleton here at some point
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Kurt Fraser
Andrew Hardaway
21 days ago
Our CeA GLP-1 story is now online. We've got a lot more cooking in this area and I think this will inform future circuit-guided GLP-1 therapeutics:
www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...
Great job to my first PhD student, Miguel Duran, who has had a hell of a week.
add a skeleton here at some point
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reposted by
Kurt Fraser
bioRxiv Neuroscience
21 days ago
The parafascicular thalamus steers attention to facilitate learning
https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.64898/2026.06.18.733204v1
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Kurt Fraser
Jeremiah Cohen
22 days ago
Excited to move to the Department of Neuroscience at the University of Minnesota in the fall. We will continue our work on neuromodulators and behavior. Positions available in the lab. Please get in touch if interested, and share broadly!
hr.myu.umn.edu/jobs/ext/374...
hr.myu.umn.edu/jobs/ext/374...
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I'm looking to hire a research technician/lab manager. This role is ideal for someone looking to gain experience and independence after undergraduate research on their way to graduate school. Please encourage anyone interested to apply:
hr.myu.umn.edu/jobs/ext/374...
(job code 374183)
loading . . .
Careers
The Fraser Lab at the University of Minnesota (https://fraserlab.psych.umn.edu/) is recruiting a full-time research technician to support the lab. As a part of the Department of Psychology we are involved in the greater neuroscience research community at the University of Minnesota which provides excellent access to training and professional development. The Fraser Lab is interested in the neurobiological basis of motivated behavior and investigates how defined brain circuits contribute to behavioral regulation. We make use of modern neuroscience approaches to record and manipulate neural activity in real-time as rodents perform complex behavioral tasks to relate precise aspects of neural activity to well-defined psychological processes. To do so, we regularly use optogenetics, chemogenetics, calcium imaging, biosensors, pharmacology, and immunohistochemistry. Our ultimate goal is to decipher the neural mechanisms regulating behavior and to characterize how these are altered in psychiatric illness, such as addiction, or by differences in lived experience, such as after early life adversity, to potentially identify novel therapeutics. We seek a team member who can play a lead role in lab operations, collaborate closely with the PI, and engage in team-building and growth.Duties:Laboratory logistics, maintenance and operations (30%):
https://hr.myu.umn.edu/jobs/ext/374183
22 days ago
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Kurt Fraser
abby (sports)
24 days ago
Everyone shut up I finally got a video of Jyn doing her cartoon snoring thing
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reposted by
Kurt Fraser
Ben Saunders
24 days ago
Check out our new paper, led brilliantly by Dr. Megan Brickner, in early view form at
@natcomms.nature.com
. We characterize BLA dopamine signaling in emotional learning - lots of insights into broad dopamine heterogeneity beyond classic value learning signals!
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
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I’m proud to admit my brain is too full of how to am become hotter to hold information about history
add a skeleton here at some point
24 days ago
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reposted by
Kurt Fraser
Olivier George
25 days ago
great paper by
@bensaunders.bsky.social
and a nice example that a neurotransmitter has no intrinsec function, it is a signal whose consequences are defined by the circuit that receives it. the function emerges.
doi.org/10.1038/s41...
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reposted by
Kurt Fraser
Olivier George
25 days ago
Clever use of a complex behavioral task to show that BLA dopamine tracks emotional salience, not value or prediction error. Threat/Safety cues drive larger, sustained signals than reward/neutral cues. Dopamine in the BLA is very much different than in the striatum.
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reposted by
Kurt Fraser
Better Things Are Possible
over 1 year ago
(living in a country where the most successful people are obscenely rich and shameless perverts and psychopaths) Time to teach my children to be honest and study hard in school
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Working hard or hardly working, Levi
30 days ago
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reposted by
Kurt Fraser
Daniel Castro
about 1 month ago
First Castro Lab paper, brought to you by the hard work of Dr. Kathryn Braden
@katybraden.bsky.social
In this manuscript we investigate the role of endogenous enkephalin or dorsal raphe nucleus. We find that it is incredibly important for buffering negative affect 😱
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
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Dorsal raphe nucleus enkephalin peptide modulates behavioral preference - Neuropsychopharmacology
Neuropsychopharmacology - Dorsal raphe nucleus enkephalin peptide modulates behavioral preference
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41386-026-02456-5
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reposted by
Kurt Fraser
Better Things Are Possible
12 months ago
It's Friday night baby
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It’s tough out there friends. Hang in there.
about 1 month ago
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reposted by
Kurt Fraser
bioRxiv Neuroscience
about 1 month ago
Chemogenetic Inhibition of Lateral Hypothalamus Inputs to the Paraventricular Thalamus Reduces Goal-Tracking in a Behaviorally Flexible Subgroup of Male Rats
https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.64898/2026.05.28.728487v1
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Summer means Levi gets to swim in the Mississippi
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about 2 months ago
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reposted by
Kurt Fraser
Zoe McElligott
about 2 months ago
the technician position in my lab is now posted! Please pass this along:
unc.peopleadmin.com/postings/319...
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Laboratory Research Technician
The Research Technician will assist with lab management operations and assist the Principal Investigator and members of the laboratory with experiments involving molecular biology, behavior, biochemis...
https://unc.peopleadmin.com/postings/319342
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Someone has had it with grant writing
about 2 months ago
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reposted by
Kurt Fraser
Laura Bradfield (she/her)
about 2 months ago
New preprint from the lab "Contingency degradation overwrites initial learning and depends on lateral orbitofrontal cortex":
url.au.m.mimecastprotect.com/s/pos5CjZ1N7...
Highlights: * Degradation reduces responding that does not spontaneously reover * Degradation does not reinstate and... 1/2
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https://url.au.m.mimecastprotect.com/s/pos5CjZ1N7i32jkk6SWf8UmDx35?domain=biorxiv.org
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reposted by
Kurt Fraser
Sydney Trask
about 2 months ago
Our new *entirely null results* paper is out. Here, we ran a series of experiments that we think convincingly demonstrate the stimulus specificity of behavioral reduction achieved through weak shock presentations.
link.springer.com/article/10.3...
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Unconditional stimulus deflation is stimulus specific - Learning & Behavior
Previous work has demonstrated that repeated presentations of a conditional stimulus (CS) with a weak shock following training with a strong shock can reduce later conditional responding to that CS. W...
https://link.springer.com/article/10.3758/s13420-026-00714-6
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reposted by
Kurt Fraser
Robin Magnard
about 2 months ago
Thrilled about our new
@janaklab.bsky.social
paper now out in
@npp-journal.bsky.social
🧠⚡ Action-sequence termination cues evoke mesolimbic dopamine activity that drives habit-like behavior. Thanks to Tricia Janak,
@younavandaele.bsky.social
, and
@yfcheng.bsky.social
!
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
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Sequence termination cues drive automated habit-like strategy via dopamine-mediated processes - Neuropsychopharmacology
Neuropsychopharmacology - Sequence termination cues drive automated habit-like strategy via dopamine-mediated processes
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41386-026-02420-3
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Easily the largest dataset of neurons recorded in the central amygdala during sucrose and alcohol self administration to date - super cool! More evidence the CeA is a motivational amplifier (but I’m biased bc it’s from
@janaklab.bsky.social
)
add a skeleton here at some point
about 2 months ago
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reposted by
Kurt Fraser
bioRxiv Neuroscience
about 2 months ago
The Central Nucleus of the Amygdala Encodes the Motivation to Pursue Ethanol
https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.64898/2026.05.11.724330v1
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Kurt Fraser
Bita Moghaddam
about 2 months ago
Out today! A truly team effort and one of my favorite lab projects The findings connect NMDA/Grin2A malfunction to dopamine dynamics and related behaviors, and provide a futuristic model to develop and test "course altering" treatments for schizophrenia
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
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Grin2a knockout in adolescent dopamine neurons disrupts prediction error signaling and produces a phenotype relevant to schizophrenia - Molecular Psychiatry
Molecular Psychiatry - Grin2a knockout in adolescent dopamine neurons disrupts prediction error signaling and produces a phenotype relevant to schizophrenia
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41380-026-03632-1
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the semester is finally over
about 2 months ago
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reposted by
Kurt Fraser
Abby Polter
about 2 months ago
FINALLY HR has the posting up for a postdoc opening in my lab ! Particularly interested in folks with electrophysiology, photometry, or behavioral experience.
www.gwu.jobs/postings/125...
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Postdoctoral Associate
The George Washington University Department of Pharmacology & Physiology is an active research department with federally funded programs in neuroscience and development, cardiovascular pharmacology an...
https://www.gwu.jobs/postings/125759
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Kurt Fraser
Laura Grima
2 months ago
Really pleased that this work with
@dudman.bsky.social
is now out in Neuron: A global dopaminergic learning rate enables adaptive foraging across many options
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Howard used to visit Lammel Lab and was always so kind and generous with his time (rare trait!) in addition to being a fellow very tall guy. What a lasting impact he will have.
add a skeleton here at some point
2 months ago
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My favorite sign of spring is here at last
2 months ago
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In Baltimore for the day and had to see the old haunts
2 months ago
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They did behaviorism to basketball what’s next, surgery on grapes
add a skeleton here at some point
2 months ago
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reposted by
Kurt Fraser
Zoe McElligott
2 months ago
I am looking for a new reserach technician. This is an entry level position ideal for a graudating senior. Please re-post and send candidates my way!
[email protected]
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