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Benjamin Cocanougher
- Alumni
- United States
- 2016 PhD Zoology
- St Catharine's College
I grew up catching praying mantises and damselflies in rural Kentucky. As an undergraduate at Centre College, I majored in Biochemistry and Molecular Biology; I spent my summers taking care of sick children at the Center for Courageous Kids and doing research in organic chemistry and neuroscience. I matriculated directly to the University of Rochester School of Medicine and Dentistry and completed my first three years of medical school. I then moved to Janelia Research Campus as a HHMI Medical Research Fellow; there I studied the neural and genetic bases of behavior. As a PhD student in Zoology, I will study adaptive behavior. All animals integrate information about past experience into future decisions; this is the basis of learning and memory. I am proposing to write a specific memory and read the memory trace in the brain. I will use the fruit fly as a model organism. By understanding mechanisms of memory storage, we can begin to investigate changes in memory formation in disease; this may allow us to develop rational therapies for disorders of memory formation, including autism and Alzheimer’s disease. After completing my PhD, I will return to finish my last year of medical school and pursue a career as a child neurologist and neuroscientist, using my lab to better understand the patients I see in clinic.
Previous Education
Centre College
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Latest News
Using ancient DNA to document past sea ice change
A Gates Cambridge Scholar has been awarded a 2.6m Euro grant to develop ancient DNA as a new tool for documenting past sea ice change. Stijn De Schepper will use the European Research Council Consolidator Grant to establish a cross-disciplinary research group of paleoceanographers and molecular ecologists. His project AGENSI – A Genetic View into Past Sea Ice Variability […]
A more diverse stand-up community
When Callie Vandewiele (2014) arrived in Cambridge she had been performing improv comedy in the US for four years. She couldn’t find an improv group in Cambridge so a friend suggested she try stand-up. Her first gig was in October 2013. Since then not only has she performed across the UK – from Norwich to […]
The politics of history
Architecture is imbued with history and destroying symbolic buildings or attempting to bring them back to life for political reasons cannot resolve past conflicts, according to Marcus Colla [2015]. His research focuses on Germany in the 1970s and 1980s, when the country was divided between the East and West. But he is also interested in […]
Four scholars named in list of US innovators and leaders
Four Gates Cambridge Scholars have been named in the Forbes 30 under 30 lists this year, highlighting up and coming leaders and innovators in a range of areas, from healthcare to science. Three of the Scholars were named in the healthcare list. Joshua Cohen [2012], who is currently an MD/PhD candidate at Johns Hopkins Medical School where he […]
Mothers: the hidden story of the struggle for equality
The stories of the mothers of influential black thinkers and activists are powerful, but have been little studied, says Anna Nti-Asare-Tubbs [2017]. As part of her PhD in Sociology, she is researching the stories of the mothers of Malcolm X, Martin Luther King Junior and James Baldwin – Alberta King, Louise Little and Emma Berdis […]
Charting the experiences of women in Antarctica
How have women integrated into everyday life in Antarctica over the past decades? What strategies have they used to succeed in male-dominated environments and how can polar science be more inclusive and representative? These are some of the strands of Morgan Seag’s research into the evolving role of women in Antarctica. She is conducting interviews […]
Making connections on the situation in Gaza
A Gates Cambridge Scholar has been invited to join a body which connects science and policy as a result of speaking at the Cambridge Festival of Ideas. Mona Jebril, who recently completed her PhD in Education, was invited to join the network of evidence and expertise at the University of Cambridge’s Centre for Science and Policy.[CSaP]. […]
A radical approach to science
A Gates Cambridge scholar is organising an Open Science Day which aims to change the way science is done. Alex Quent [2017] has invited researchers from brain sciences and neuroscience to the 20th November event at the MRC Cognition and Brain Sciences Unit. The event will discuss open science practices, enabling researchers to make science more open. […]
Scholar speaks at Grand Challenges meeting
A Gates Cambridge Scholar was invited to take part in the annual Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation’s Grand Challenges meeting in Berlin this week. Carol Ibe [2015] spoke about her PhD research in Plant Sciences and her non-profit organisation JR Biotek Foundation in the Crop Research Track Session of the Grand Challenges meeting. She also participated in a […]
The science of hallucinations
Colleen Rollins has long been interested in how the brain works and in mental health so it is appropriate that she is studying hallucinations in patients with schizophrenia. “As someone interested in how the brain works, hallucinations are an intriguing phenomenon,” she says. “Through them it is possible to probe our perception of how we […]
