Dr. Natalina Salmaso is an Associate Professor in the department of Neuroscience and holds the Canada Research Chair in Behavioural Neurobiology. Dr. Salmaso is also a licensed clinical psychologist and has a small private practice in Ottawa, Canada. Dr. Salmaso maintains an active laboratory and also does undergraduate teaching and administrative tasks both at Carleton University and within the scientific community.
Eligible to supervise undergraduate and graduate level.
Courses Taught:
- NEUR 2202: Neurodevelopment and Plasticity
- NEUR 4302: Sex and the Brain
Scholarly Work & Research Interests:
The Salmaso Lab studies the sex differences and astroglial cells in neurodevelopment, neuroplasticity, and psychiatric and neurological diseases, including depression, anxiety, and Parkinson's disease. Their research spans from basic research studying the molecular mechanisms (e.g. transcriptomic work) to translational work examining the predictive value of target molecules as therapeutic biomarkers in patients.
- How sex, gender, and hormones are associated with risk or resilience to disease morbidity and prognosis
- Astroglial control of neuronal and subsequent effect on behaviour in early development, response to stress, and in Parkinson's disease models
- Astroglial and hormone interactions
Selected Publications:
Chandler, K.; Sosso-Douley, H.; Simard, S.; Siddiqi, S.; Salmaso, N. (2020) Environmental enrichment enhances stem cell potential and learning and memory in juveniles but not adults. Neuroscience.
Rurak, G.M., Simard, S., Van Geel, A.*, Stead, J. Woodside, B., Coppola, G., Salmaso, N. (2020) Translatomic database of cortical astroglia across male and female mouse development reveals two distinct developmental phenotypes. Preprint at BioRXiv http://dx.doi.org/10.1101/681684
Coppola, G.; Rurak, G.M.; Simard, S.; Salmaso, N. (2019). A Further Analysis and Commentary on: Profiling Changes in Cortical Astroglial Cells Following Chronic Stress. Journal of Experimental Neuroscience. 13: 0.
Simard, S.; Shail, P.; Macgregor, J.*; ElSayed, M.; Duman, R.S.; Vaccarino, F.M.; Salmaso,N. (2018). Fibroblast growth factor 2 is necessary for the anti-depressant effects of fluoxetine. PLoS One.
Simard, S.,* Coppola, G., Rudyk, C.A.; Hayley, S., Salmaso, N. (2018) Towards a neuroplasticity hypothesis of depression: astroglia as key mediators. Neuropsychopharmacology.
Salmaso. N., Stevens, H., McNeill, J., ElSayed, M., Ren, Q., Maragnoli, M.E., Tomasi, S., Schwartz, M.L., Sapolsky, R.M., Duman, R., Vaccarino, F.M. (2016). Fibroblast growth factor 2 modulates anxiety behavior and hypothalamic pituitary axis activity through glucocorticoid receptors. Biological Psychiatry. Sep 15;80(6):479-89.
Salmaso, N. , Jablonska, B. , Scafidi, J ., Vaccarino, F.M. , Gallo, V. (2014). Neurobiology of premature brain injury. Nature Neuroscience. 17(3): 341-6.