Caroline Palavicino-Maggio facts for kids
Quick facts for kids
Caroline Palavicino-Maggio
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| Born | January 30 |
| Nationality | American |
| Alma mater | Rider College Rutgers University at New Jersey Medical School Harvard Medical School |
| Known for | Neural circuits underlying aggression in female Drosophila |
| Scientific career | |
| Fields | Neuroscience |
| Institutions | Harvard Medical School |
Caroline Palavicino-Maggio is an American neuroscientist. She is a professor at Harvard Medical School. She also leads a lab at McLean Hospital. Her lab studies how our brains control social behaviors, especially aggression. Dr. Palavicino-Maggio is also passionate about helping young people. She especially helps students who are the first in their families to go to college. She wants to inspire them to study science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM). She helps run a journal that publishes research by middle and high school students. This helps young scientists learn about academic research.
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Early Life and Education
Caroline Palavicino-Maggio was born in Harlem, New York City. She grew up in Washington Heights. Her mother came from Colombia. Her father, who was a Mapuche descendant, came from Chile. Her family later moved to Edgewater, New Jersey. Her mother worked in a factory there. Her father worked as an elevator mechanic in New York City.
When Dr. Palavicino-Maggio was 13, a difficult family event happened. This made her want to study the brain and behavior. She also saw challenges in her neighborhood. These experiences made her even more interested in how the brain controls behavior. Her goal is to use her research to help people. She wants to make positive changes in society.
College and Early Research
In 2002, Dr. Palavicino-Maggio earned her bachelor's degree. She studied Biopsychology and Political Sociology at Rider University. This university is in Lawrenceville, New Jersey. After college, she worked as a research assistant. She worked at Rockefeller University and Columbia University from 2002 to 2008. During this time, she shared her research at a big science conference. There, she met a dean from New Jersey Medical School. He encouraged her to go to graduate school.
Graduate School Studies
In 2009, Dr. Palavicino-Maggio started her PhD at Rutgers University at New Jersey Medical School. She studied Pharmacology and Physiology. Her research focused on how certain medicines for mental health can cause weight gain. Many patients stop taking these important medicines because of side effects like weight gain. She wanted to understand why this happens. Her goal was to find ways to help patients stay healthy.
She studied how these medicines might affect how the body absorbs sugar. She found that a medicine called clozapine caused weight gain in mice. It also increased how much sugar their intestines absorbed. This sugar transporter was important for the weight gain. She earned her PhD in 2013. Her thesis was about how these medicines affect the body. She dedicated her thesis to her late sister. She wrote that her sister's love and belief helped her achieve her goals.
Career in Neuroscience
After her PhD, Dr. Palavicino-Maggio wanted to continue her research. In 2016, she began her postdoctoral work at Harvard Medical School. Before starting, she took a special course. This course taught her about Drosophila neurobiology. Drosophila are fruit flies. She was preparing to study aggression in these flies. She worked with Edward Kravitz at Harvard.
Studying Aggression in Fruit Flies
Dr. Palavicino-Maggio's research looks at how proteins in Drosophila melanogaster (fruit flies) affect aggressive behavior. By understanding how aggression works in these simple animals, scientists can learn more about how genes control behavior. This research could help in understanding brain disorders in people.
She studied aggressive behavior in different types of fruit flies. She found that flies from cooler places were more aggressive. They also had more successful courtship behaviors. This research was published in a major science journal in 2019. Dr. Palavicino-Maggio and her team wanted to know which brain circuits control aggression in female flies. They also wondered if these circuits were important in male flies.
Many people think male animals are always more aggressive. But Dr. Palavicino-Maggio found something different in her flies. Some female flies were extremely aggressive. The male flies from the same group had normal aggression. The female fights even led to social rankings among the flies. Her team then looked for the specific brain cells that caused this behavior. They found a few special neurons in the female fly brain. These neurons seemed to drive the aggressive behavior in females. Interestingly, these specific neurons were not found in males. This discovery is very exciting. It shows that a small group of brain cells can control strong behaviors. This helps scientists understand how brain cells work together to create complex social behaviors.
Helping the Community and Science
Dr. Palavicino-Maggio is a strong supporter of diversity and inclusion in science. She works on several committees at Harvard. These committees focus on making science welcoming for everyone. She also advises a program that helps students learn about health careers.
Journal of Emerging Investigators
She is the Director of Outreach for the Journal of Emerging Investigators. This journal publishes research by middle and high school students. It helps young scientists, especially those from groups not often seen in science, learn about research. As Director of Outreach, she helps find student research from all over the world. She works with students from Central America, South America, and Africa.
One project she worked on with students in Boston looked at bacteria. They wanted to see if bacteria in Boston were resistant to antibiotics. They grew bacteria from water fountains, traffic lights, phones, and sneakers. They also took samples from the Harvard T-station (subway). They found that only the bacteria from the Harvard T-station showed signs of being resistant to an antibiotic called ampicillin.
Promoting Equity in STEM
Within Harvard's Office for Diversity, Inclusion, and Community Partnership, Dr. Palavicino-Maggio is very active. She is on committees that work on community engagement and social justice. She helps suggest ideas for events and discussions. She also helps find ways to give high school students from underrepresented groups the skills they need to succeed in STEM, especially in biosciences.
Dr. Palavicino-Maggio also works to connect scientists from America and Cuba. She helped host a Cuban scientist, Enrique Beldarrain Chaple. He is a professor and researcher in public health.
Awards and Honors
- 1998: Eleanor Humanitarian Award
- 1998: Unilever Research, U.S., Scholarship Recipient
- 2008: Rutgers University, Honor Society for Research Scholars
- 2008: Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, Pre-doctoral Sloan Scholar
- 2011: NIMH Independent Research Grant - Effects of Atypical Antipsychotics on Fructose Metabolism and Weight Gain
- 2012: New York Academy of Sciences with PepsiCo, R&D Young Scientist Award
- 2016: Harvard Medical School, Society for Translational and Academic Researcher Fellow
Selected Works and Publication
Wikidata () Wikidata ()
See also
In Spanish: Caroline Palavicino-Maggio para niños
