Marisa Roberto, Ph.D.

Professor

Department of Molecular Medicine
Schimmel Family Chair

The Scripps Research Institute
La Jolla, California

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Marisa Roberto, Ph.D., is a Professor in the Department of Neuroscience at The Scripps Research Institute in La Jolla, California. She is also an investigator in the Pearson Center for Alcoholism and Addiction Research. Her current research focuses on the central effects of drugs of abuse. Specifically, she is studying the cellular physiology of the central nucleus of the amygdala, a brain structure involved in emotional processing. Dr. Roberto has identified important changes in the activity of both inhibitory and excitatory neurons using cellular recording of neuronal activity in slices of the amygdala after acute and chronic alcohol exposure. Neuropeptides such as corticotropin-releasing factor, neuropeptide Y and nociceptin/orphanin N/OFQ, as well as neuroimmune factors, have been found to play key roles in mediating these effects. Dr. Roberto won the Young Investigator Award from the Research on Alcoholism in 2005, she was the Presidential Award Recipient for the 2009 Presidential Early Career Awards for Scientists and Engineers (PECASE), and received the Jacob P. Waletzky Award from the Society of Neuroscience in 2016.