Dr. Nikki Crowley
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nicoleacrowley.bsky.social
Dr. Nikki Crowley
@nicoleacrowley.bsky.social
Director, Penn State Neuroscience Institute - University Park; Huck Early Career Chair in Neurobiology and Neural Engineering, Departments of Biology & Biomedical Engineering.
Reposted by Dr. Nikki Crowley
Congrats to Ella for her new paper! She asked a really interesting question about how the brain represents uncertainty during hidden state inference, and in a lovely crossover with theoretical work, she shows that in mice, acetylcholine dynamics play a crucial role. www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...
Acetylcholine reflects uncertainty during hidden state inference
To act adaptively, animals must infer features of the environment that cannot be observed directly, such as which option is currently rewarding, or which context they are in. These internal estimates,...
www.biorxiv.org
November 14, 2025 at 9:57 AM
Reposted by Dr. Nikki Crowley
What an exciting program for GRC Frontal Cortex in 2026! www.grc.org/frontal-cort...
2026 Frontal Cortex Conference GRC
The 2026 Gordon Research Conference on Frontal Cortex will be held in Holderness, New Hampshire. Apply today to reserve your spot.
www.grc.org
November 3, 2025 at 7:18 PM
Would you believe sweet little Alice is apparently a 💯 trash talker
October 19, 2025 at 12:22 AM
We have a little bit less than 2 weeks left until we begin application review-consider joining us at Penn State! We are open to ANY areas of neuroscience, and I can genuinely say The PSU Biology Department is a fantastic place to work. please share broadly!

psu.wd1.myworkdayjobs.com/PSU_Academic...
October 17, 2025 at 7:15 PM
Key contributions to lab meeting
October 17, 2025 at 5:00 PM
🧠 + 🎃 + 👻 + 🔬 = 📽️
Behind-the-scenes of Huck Institutes of the Life Sciences Associate Director Patrick Drew & me filming some spooky season neuroscience videos for Penn State. We got to nerd out on frightening brain facts and old experiment. Can you tell my lab had fun decorating 😂
October 16, 2025 at 5:33 PM
Reposted by Dr. Nikki Crowley
Excellent first day at @pennstateuniv.bsky.social for the Marker lectures hanging out with science celebrities @nicoleacrowley.bsky.social @drohsopretty.bsky.social @symbionticism.bsky.social
plus several more folks I was too shy to ask for selfies
October 15, 2025 at 2:20 AM
Homecoming, Eberly College of Science style #WeAre @pennstateuniv.bsky.social
October 10, 2025 at 11:46 PM
Reposted by Dr. Nikki Crowley
Excited to share the Special Issue on "Stress and Addiction" in Addiction Neuroscience is now available. Huge kudos to guest editors Karl Schmidt and Anushree Karkhanis and all the authors who contributed. www.sciencedirect.com/special-issu...
Addiction Neuroscience | Stress <-> Addiction | ScienceDirect.com by Elsevier
Stress and drugs of abuse have a bidirectional relationship, such that stress is often seen as a driver of drug use, while at the same time drug use/abuse alters stress responses. Acute exposure to a ...
www.sciencedirect.com
October 9, 2025 at 1:22 PM
Reposted by Dr. Nikki Crowley
Horror movies lists for Halloween season starting tomorrow. No one is more excited then @nicoleacrowley.bsky.social
a person in a scream mask is standing in front of a stainless steel refrigerator
ALT: a person in a scream mask is standing in front of a stainless steel refrigerator
media.tenor.com
October 2, 2025 at 3:21 AM
WE ARE... hiring!

Penn State Biology & the Huck Institutes of the Life Sciences is recruiting a tenure track or tenured neurobiologist (Assistant or Associate Professor rank), and the committee is open to a broad scope of scientific questions.

psu.wd1.myworkdayjobs.com/PSU_Academic...
September 18, 2025 at 9:56 AM
Reposted by Dr. Nikki Crowley
I was going to write a whole post about all this incredible work with all these amazing scientists and organizations, but I’ll just leave @stellatecomms.bsky.social design sizzle reel here.

It speaks for itself.

youtu.be/x2O7DkpIoCA?...
Stellate Communications Reel
YouTube video by Stellate Communications
youtu.be
September 16, 2025 at 1:20 PM
Reposted by Dr. Nikki Crowley
OPEN INVITATION to the One Health Microbiome Symposium, May 13-14, 2026!! This is not your typical siloed topic conference. It unifies diverse research fields in microbiome science across Ag, Envtl, and Human Health. 1/n

www.eventbrite.com/e/2026-one-h...
2026 One Health Microbiome Symposium
The 2026 One Health Microbiome Symposium will be hosted at Penn State University. Abstract submissions will open early 2026.
www.eventbrite.com
September 16, 2025 at 12:07 AM
Probably my one and only time with a game view like this!
September 14, 2025 at 2:21 PM
Reposted by Dr. Nikki Crowley
We are excited to announce our 2025 SPINE Fellows! We also appreciate everyone who submitted applications this year - it was great to read about everyone's awesome science! If you have not already, please register for SPINE by 9/24 and submit poster abstracts by 9/22 (extended) at spinephilly.org!
September 8, 2025 at 4:46 PM
Reposted by Dr. Nikki Crowley
Really excited that our special collection generated from the last CPPC conference is in the Journal of Neuroscience. Check out this article for a preview of all the great work featured.

w/ @erinlrich.bsky.social @narayananlab.bsky.social and Jeremy Seamans

www.jneurosci.org/content/45/3...
Computational Properties of the Prefrontal Cortex
The term “prefrontal” appears to have been coined in the first volume of Brain in the context of describing the curious case of Phineas Gage, inspired by the skull anatomy of fish (Girard, 1851; Anon,...
www.jneurosci.org
September 11, 2025 at 7:26 PM
HUGE CONGRATS to Victoria Nudell for receiving the NOA on her NIAAA F30 NRSA award. This is the first F30 fellowship for our lab!! Many thanks to her co-mentor Leon Coleman at UNC for his guidance and support of double docs, and to NIAAA to continue to support our work and vision.
September 10, 2025 at 11:11 PM
kindergarten and 5th! work friends are in for a real treat as Alice has planned a week of matching dresses to celebrate 😂
August 26, 2025 at 2:16 PM
Reposted by Dr. Nikki Crowley
Excited to announce that I’ll be the Director of the Huck Institutes of the Life Sciences Genomics Core Facility starting mid September 🧬🧪🧫

www.psu.edu/news/huck-in...
New director appointed at Huck Institutes Genomics Core | Penn State University
Research Professor Cheryl Keller has been named the new director of the Genomics Core Facility in the Huck Institutes of the Life Sciences.
www.psu.edu
August 22, 2025 at 9:09 PM
Reposted by Dr. Nikki Crowley
Join us in Congratulating the 2025 ACNP Travel Award Class! 🙌🎉
August 8, 2025 at 1:01 PM
Reposted by Dr. Nikki Crowley
and here is the key, "The clear message to emerge here is that the reporting of both methods and results needs to be improved." does not equal a replication crisis or indicate that studies cannot be replicated. It is a problem. It just isn't that particular problem.
August 8, 2025 at 7:52 PM
Check out the August Penn State Neuroscience Institute newsletter!

eepurl.com/jkshiI
Penn State Neuroscience Newsletter - 8/4/2025
eepurl.com
August 6, 2025 at 6:45 AM
Still on vacay mode 😎
August 5, 2025 at 3:28 PM
Reposted by Dr. Nikki Crowley
While everything is burning around us, a rare great day for Flanigan Lab!

Thank you to BBRF for funding our NARSAD!

Thank you to MUSC COBRE CNDD for funding our Pilot Proposal!

Looking forward to doing some awesome science
August 5, 2025 at 2:37 PM
Wiki sticks are the grossest of kids toys, no contest. Germ collector masquerading as a creative toy.
August 5, 2025 at 9:44 AM