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Kellie Tamashiro

Kellie Tamashiro, PhD

Johns Hopkins Affiliations:
  • Johns Hopkins School of Medicine Faculty

Languages

  • English

Gender

Female

About Kellie Tamashiro

Primary Academic Title

Professor of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences

Centers and Institutes

Mood Disorders Center

Recent News Articles and Media Coverage

  • Happy Thanksgiving: If Kids Exercise, They Are Not Doomed By Maternal Epigenetics To Be ObeseScience 2.0November 28, 2013

Contact for Research Inquiries

Ross Building
720 Rutland Avenue
Baltimore, MD 21205

Phone: (410) 614-9151
Fax: (410) 502-3769
ktamashiro@jhmi.edu

Research Interests

Stress, depression, obesity, ingestive behavior, eating disorders, Developmental Origins of Health and Disease (DOHaD), epigenetics, neuroendocrinology, animal models

Lab Website

Behavioral Neuroscience Laboratory - Lab Website

Research Summary

Our research program focuses on the developmental origins of disease. Stressors, including altered diet, psychosocial stress, immune challenge, during gestation can have adverse consequences on the intrauterine environment and increase disease susceptibility of the developing fetus.  The long-term effects on offspring include greater susceptibility to psychiatric disease, such as depression and anxiety disorders, and adverse metabolic conditions including obesity, diabetes and cardiovascular disease.  Studies in the laboratory use rodent models and incorporate a multilevel approach to determine the behavioral, physiological, and neural correlates of disease development.  Genetic and epigenetic approaches are used to further elucidate molecular mechanisms that may increase susceptibility to psychiatric disease and will facilitate development of diagnostic biomarkers and novel clinical interventions for such conditions. 

Another area of interest in the lab is in eating disorders. We use a rat animal model of anorexia (“activity-based anorexia”) to identify the factors that serve to perpetuate and sustain anorexia nervosa-like behavior and increase the likelihood of relapse. 

 

Honors

  • Alan N. Epstein Research Award, Society for the Study of Ingestive Behavior, 7/1/14
  • Ethan Sims Young Investigator Award Finalist, The Obesity Society, 10/1/07
  • K99/R00 Pathway to Independence Award, NIH, 1/1/06
  • Post-Doctoral Fellow, Training Grant in Psychiatry & Neuroscience (T32 MH-15330), 1/1/05
  • Omicron Delta Kappa National Leadership Honor Society, 1/1/04
  • Pre-Doctoral Fellow, Training Grant in Neuroendocrinology (T32 DK-59803), 1/1/03
  • Fellowship, Albert J. Ryan Foundation, 1/1/02
  • Fellowship, University Distinguished Graduate, 1/1/00

Graduate Program Affiliations

  • Faculty, Cellular & Molecular Medicine Graduate Program

Memberships

  • Society for Neuroscience
  • Society for the Study of Ingestive Behavior
  • The Obesity Society
  • Society of Biological Psychiatry

Additional Training

Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, Maryland, 2008, Psychiatry & Neuroscience

Expertise

Education

University of Cincinnati

Ph.D., 2005

University of Hawaii (Manoa)

M.S., 1999

University of Hawaii

B.B.A., 1992