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The Glover Lab Research Team

Elizabeth Glover PhD

Assistant Professor
Director of the CARE Behavior Core
Department of Psychiatry, UIC

Dr. Glover completed her BS in Zoology at Arizona State University in 2001 and subsequently worked as a research assistant studying nonhuman primate behavior at the Southwest National Primate Research Center in San Antonio, TX. She earned her PhD in Neuroscience in 2012 from Wake Forest University School of Medicine where she investigated the effects of chronic alcohol self-administration on the serotonin system in nonhuman primates under the mentorship of Dr. David Friedman.

Nistha Agarwal

Undergraduate Research Assistant, Glover Lab

Nistha is currently pursuing a major in psychology on a pre-med track at UIC. She is an Undergraduate Research Assistant at the Glover Lab. In the future, she wants to go to medical school and aspires to become a psychiatrist. She is interested in learning more about therapy techniques and anxiety-depression disorders.

Nathaly Arce Soto BS

Research Specialist, The Glover Lab
Department of Psychiatry, UIC

Nathaly Arce Soto is a Research Specialist at the Glover Lab UIC’s Center for Alcohol Research in Epigenetics. She is involved in research projects investigating the neurobiological underpinnings of addiction, specifically reward and aversion. Arce Soto received her BS in Neuroscience with a minor in Political Science from UIC. As an undergrad, she was involved in several research projects in Glover Lab, such as looking at changes in myelination of habenular afferents and efferents during chronic intermittent ethanol exposure, parameters affecting acquisition and magnitude of operant ethanol self-administration in rats, and sex and individual differences in the response to aversive properties of ethanol.

Kevin Michael Boergens PhD

Research Assistant Professor
Department of Physics
The University of Illinois Chicago

Kevin Boergens is a Research Assistant Professor in the Departments of Physics and Biological Sciences at the University of Illinois Chicago. Kevin came to UIC from Austin, Texas where he worked in industry at Paradromics Inc. to build high data-rate brain computer interfaces (BCI). His research interests at UIC include using 3D electron microscopy to map brain circuits. His newest efforts focus on developing photoemission electron microscopy as a tool for neuroscience and mapping brain structures involved in alcohol use disorder. Kevin received his doctorate from the Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich.

Karl Y. Bosque-Cordero PhD

Postdoctoral Research Fellow
Department of Psychiatry, UIC

Karl obtained his bachelor's in biology at the University of Puerto Rico at Aguadilla. For his Ph.D. in Biology, he attended the University of Puerto Rico Rio Piedras Campus and completed his dissertation in the laboratory of Dr. Carlos A. Jimenez-Rivera. His thesis explored the contribution of the hyperpolarizing cationic current in cocaine-induced excitability on dopaminergic neurons of the ventral tegmental area using both in vivo single-unit recordings and ex vivo patch-clamp electrophysiology. He joined the Glover Lab in September 2022 and is interested in exploring the basic mechanisms of reward and aversion in alcohol use disorder, focusing on the role that astrocytes may play in altering neurotransmission in the Rostromedial tegmental nucleus and the Lateral Habenula during alcohol withdrawal.

Shikun Hou BS

Research Specialist
Department of Psychiatry, UIC

Shikun graduated from the University of Illinois Chicago with a BS in neuroscience and minors in philosophy and bioengineering. He is currently a research technician in the Glover Lab working on a project exploring the role of rodent prefrontal cortex in reward prediction error and its potential implication in psychiatric conditions.

Brianna Irizarry

Undergraduate Research Assistant, Glover Lab

Brianna is an undergraduate student majoring in Neuroscience. She is interested in studying behavior and medicine. She hopes to attend medical school after graduating.

Umme Kazmi

Undergraduate Research Assistant, the CoNECt Lab and ListenUP Research Collaborative Lab

Umme is a second-year undergraduate student in the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences at the University of Illinois at Chicago. She is majoring in Neuroscience and will be graduating in the spring of 2027. She is passionate about medicine and research, with a particular interest in neurology.

Nikki Kinarasri BS

Research Technician, Glover Lab

Nikki graduated from the University of Illinois Chicago with a Bachelor of Science in Neuroscience and a minor in Computer Science. Beginning her research journey as an undergraduate research assistant in 2022, she is now a research technician at the Glover Lab.

Eric H. Mitten PhD

Postdoctoral Fellow, Glover Lab

Eric completed their BA in Neuroscience at the University of Colorado: Boulder in 2019. While earning this degree, they worked in Dr.

Manuela Narvaez

Undergraduate Research Assistant, Glover Lab

Manuela Narvaez is a biomedical engineering student with a strong interest in neural engineering and biomedical sciences. She recently joined the Glover Lab to deepen her research experience and explore potential paths for graduate study.

Joseph Pitock BS

Research Specialist – Natural Sciences

Joseph Pitock is the current lab manager of the Glover Lab in UIC’s Center for Alcohol Research in Epigenetics where he provides administrative and research support on projects investigating the neurobiological underpinnings of addiction, specifically reward and aversion. Joseph received his BS in Psychology, with minors in Mathematics and Neuroscience from Bradley University. During his time as an undergraduate he was involved in several research labs exploring topics: ostracism’s impact on college student binge drinking, CBD’s therapeutic effects on PTSD, and a self-math overlap manipulation and its effect on math anxiety.

Yazhini Ramesh

Undergraduate Research Assistant, Glover Lab

Yazhini Ramesh is an undergraduate student majoring in Biomedical Engineering. She is currently a sophomore. She volunteers at the Glover Lab. She assists researchers in Dr. Glover's lab with laboratory duties.

Lindsey Ramirez PhD, MS

Postdoctoral Research Fellow
Department of Psychiatry
University of Illinois Chicago

Lindsey Ramirez is a postdoctoral fellow in the laboratory of Dr. Elizabeth Glover. Lindsey earned her B.A. in Applied Psychology at UIC. During her undergraduate training, she worked at the Substance Use Research Lab and became interested in substance abuse. Lindsey went onto have a diverse research experience. She studied pain during her Master’s training. Her doctoral work focused on the role of inflammatory immune cells to promote increases in fat tissue and blood pressure in female and male rodents. As a postdoctoral fellow, Lindsey is interested to understand the circuitry that mediates aversion in substance use disorder. Lindsey is also interested in science communication and making science accessible to everyone regardless of background.

Jackie Sanchez BS

Graduate Student Researcher
Graduate Program in Neuroscience
Department of Psychiatry, UIC

Jackie completed her BS in Psychology with a concentration in Behavioral Neuroscience at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in 2019. After graduating, she completed a post-baccalaureate program at the University of Arizona through the NIH (PREP). During this period, Jackie spent most of her time doing neuroimmunology research. She is currently a graduate student at UIC in the Graduate Program in Neuroscience (GPN). Her research interests include discovering the underlying neural mechanisms of substance use disorders and addictive behaviors. She joined Dr. Glover’s lab to further strengthen her research techniques in the field, and learn how neural circuits give rise to aversive behaviors in alcohol use disorder (AUD).

Hyerim Yang BS

Research Technician
Graduate Student, Graduate Education in Medical Sciences (GEMS) PhD Program
Department of Psychiatry, UIC

Hyerim graduated from UIC in 2017 with a BS in neuroscience. She is currently gaining experience using animal models to study the neurobiological basis in the context of alcohol use disorder.

Gerardo Zambrano

Undergraduate Research Assistant, Glover Lab

Gerardo Zambrano is an undergraduate student in the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences at the University of Illinois Chicago. He is majoring in Biological Sciences with a minor in Psychology, while also following the Pre-Med track. Aiming to attend medical school after graduating in 2027, Gerardo is interested in one day becoming a psychiatrist and intends to gain more experience in the field.

Jada Caldwell

Undergraduate Research Assistant, Glover Lab

Jada Caldwell started her studies at University of Illinois Chicago in 2022. Jada is a student that is apart of the Dusable scholars program at The University of Illinois