Margaret Minnig

School: MED ’21
Program: Graduate Program for Neuroscience
Fulbright Country: Germany
Project Title: Addiction Neuroscience and Treatment in Germany

During her undergraduate studies at Northeastern University, and employment as a research technician during her gap year, Margaret became interested in systems neuroscience, or the study of neural circuits that influence behavior. As a dual-degree MD/PhD student in the School of Medicine and in the Graduate Program for Neuroscience, Margaret has seen the impact of substance use disorders on the patient population served by Boston Medical Center, and is studying the neurobiology of these disorders for her PhD thesis in BUSM’s Laboratory of Addictive Disorders. Through her Fulbright Award, she will continue her investigation of neuropeptide modulation of circuits involved in alcohol use disorder at the Max Planck Institute in Cologne. She is excited to learn a technique there to probe alcohol use disorder pathology at the single neuron level. She plans to also compare the current treatments of substance use disorders in Germany to those of the United States, to further add to her clinical exposure to the methods used for treatment.