Courtney A. Miller Explained

Courtney A. Miller
Nationality:American
Fields:Neuroscience
Workplaces:The Scripps Research Institute, Florida
Alma Mater:University of California, Santa Barbara, University of California, Irvine, University of Alabama Birmingham
Known For:Discovery that the drug Blebbistatin leads to long-lasting disruption in methamphetamine drug seeking
Awards:PECASE - Presidential Early Career Award for Scientists and Engineers) - awarded by President Obama, TSRI Outstanding Mentor Award, Most influential paper published by Neuron in 2007, Kauffman Fellow, Venture Capital Program, NIDA Young Investigator Award

Courtney A. Miller is an American neuroscientist and Professor of the Department of Molecular Medicine at the Scripps Research Institute in Jupiter, Florida. Miller investigates the biological basis of neurological and neuropsychiatric diseases and develops novel therapeutics based on her mechanistic discoveries.

Early life and education

Miller completed her undergraduate degree at the University of California, Santa Barbara majoring in Biopsychology.[1] After graduating in 1999, Miller started her PhD in Neurobiology and Behavior at the University of California, Irvine.[2] Under the mentorship of Dr. John F. Marshall, Miller studied the biological basis of drug addiction in rodent models.[3] [4] Since relapse is common in drug abusers, Miller sought to understand the biological basis of this phenomenon. Miller first dissected the neural circuits that are activated during re-exposure to an environment previously associated with cocaine.[4] Miller found that, during expression of drug induced place preference, the Basolateral Amygdala complex provides more excitatory drive to the Nucleus Accumbens Core than the Prelimbic cortex.[4] In a first author paper in Neuron, Miller reported that inhibiting ERK kinase MEK prevents the activation of ERK in the Nucleus Accumbens Core and inhibits conditioned place preference.[3] Her findings suggested that memories of drug-cue pairings can be pharmacologically or therapeutically ameliorated to potentially reduce relapse in drug abusers.[3]

Miller completed her PhD in 2005 and then worked as a Research Scientist at Cenomed Pharmaceuticals. In 2006, Miller began a postdoctoral fellowship[5] at the University of Alabama Birmingham and held the title of scientific director of the Behavior Core at the University of Alabama Birmingham from 2006 to 2009.[2] At UAB, Miller studied neuroepigenetics and found that DNA methylation along with the process of histone acetylation regulates memory formation and synaptic plasticity.[6] Also while at UAB, Miller completed a degree in Technology Ventures at the UAB School of Business from 2007 to 2008.[2]

Career and research

In 2009, Miller was appointed an assistant professorship at The Scripps Research Institute in Jupiter, Florida.[2] In 2013, Miller was granted tenure and now remains at Scripps conducting research on neurological diseases with a specific focus on drug addiction and post-traumatic stress disorder.[1] [2] With her background in industry and business, Miller has a strong focus on making sure her research is translational and will progress towards the drug discovery pipeline.[2] [7]

Miller and her lab made a significant discovery in 2015 regarding the potential to target the actin cytoskeleton as a means to treat relapsing methamphetamine addiction.[8] [9] Miller found that inhibiting actin polymerization in the amygdala, with a non-muscle myosin II inhibitor, disrupted drug-seeking behavior.[8] In 2017, Miller and her group furthered these findings by exploring the effects of Blebbistatin, a small molecular non-muscle myosin II inhibitor, on methamphetamine-related memories compared to cocaine and morphine-related memories.[10] They found that the effects of Blebbistatin on memory disruption are specific to methamphetamine-related memories and they are amygdala dependent.[10] This finding will pave the way for specific therapeutic interventions for addiction that treatments that do not require re-exposure to the drug cues.[10] [11] For this discovery, Miller was honored with the Presidential Early Career Award and received a five-year research grant to support furthering her findings towards clinical trials.[5]

In 2019, Miller and her group found a microRNA in the amygdala that is specifically elevated after trauma.[12] They discovered this microRNA by sequencing RNA from the Basolateral Amygdala, a brain region known to be implicated in fear conditioning, to observe differences in microRNAs levels after fear conditioning. Fear conditioning is done in this experiment to model the biological processes that might occur after traumas that precede the development of post-traumatic stress disorder. Miller's results shows that the most robustly down-regulated microRNA after fear conditioning was mir-589-3p.[13] Miller and her group further found that inhibiting this microRNA interfered with expression and extinction of fear memories.[13] Interestingly, the difference in microRNA mir-598-3p level and the effect of its inhibition was only observed in male but not female mice.[13]

In addition to her translational research, Miller is a strong advocate for women in science and is the cofounder of the Professional Women's Nexus, an organization that provides a network for female professionals to connect and support each other in their career.[14] Miller has given many talks on how to foster early career success for women and in 2019 she organized the SFN Professional Development workshop “Addressing issues facing women in the early stages of their scientific career”.[15] [16]

Awards and achievements

Select publications

Notes and References

  1. Web site: Courtney Miller Scripps Research. www.scripps.edu. en. 2020-03-28.
  2. Web site: Courtney A. Miller, Ph.D.. www.scripps.edu. 2020-03-28.
  3. Miller. Courtney A.. Marshall. John F.. 2005-09-15. Molecular substrates for retrieval and reconsolidation of cocaine-associated contextual memory. Neuron. 47. 6. 873–884. 10.1016/j.neuron.2005.08.006. 0896-6273. 16157281. 631951. free.
  4. Miller. Courtney A.. Marshall. John F.. March 2005. Altered Fos expression in neural pathways underlying cue-elicited drug seeking in the rat. The European Journal of Neuroscience. 21. 5. 1385–1393. 10.1111/j.1460-9568.2005.03974.x. 0953-816X. 15813948. 24152704.
  5. Web site: Scripps Florida's Courtney Miller Wins Presidential Early Career Award. Institute. The Scripps Research. www.prnewswire.com. en. 2020-03-28.
  6. Miller. Courtney A.. Campbell. Susan L.. Sweatt. J. David. DNA methylation and histone acetylation work in concert to regulate memory formation and synaptic plasticity. May 2008. Neurobiology of Learning and Memory. 89. 4. 599–603. 10.1016/j.nlm.2007.07.016. 1074-7427. 2430891. 17881251.
  7. Web site: Memory Research Offers Promise for a Meth Addiction Treatment. Psychiatry & Behavioral Health Learning Network. en. 2020-03-28.
  8. Young. Erica. Briggs. Sherri. A. Miller. Courtney. 2015-05-29. The Actin Cytoskeleton as a Therapeutic Target for the Prevention of Relapse to Methamphetamine Use. CNS & Neurological Disorders Drug Targets. 14. 6. 731–737. 10.2174/1871527314666150529145531. 26022262. 4641563.
  9. Web site: Managing Memories Scripps Research. www.scripps.edu. 2020-03-28.
  10. Briggs. Sherri B.. Blouin. Ashley M.. Young. Erica J.. Rumbaugh. Gavin. Miller. Courtney A.. February 2017. Memory disrupting effects of nonmuscle myosin II inhibition depend on the class of abused drug and brain region. Learning & Memory. 24. 2. 70–75. 10.1101/lm.043976.116. 1072-0502. 5238718. 28096495.
  11. Web site: Scripps team finds a drug that fights addiction by eliminating memories. FierceBiotech. en. 2020-03-28.
  12. Web site: Overcoming PTSD: Study reveals memory disruption drug target. EurekAlert!. en. 2020-03-28.
  13. Jones. Meghan E.. Sillivan. Stephanie E.. Jamieson. Sarah. Rumbaugh. Gavin. Miller. Courtney A.. September 2019. microRNA mir-598-3p mediates susceptibility to stress enhancement of remote fear memory. Learning & Memory . 26. 9. 363–372. 10.1101/lm.048827.118. 1549-5485. 6699414. 31416909.
  14. Web site: Professional Women's Nexus: About Us. Professional Women's Nexus. 2020-03-28.
  15. Web site: Addressing Issues Facing Women in the Early Stages of their Scientific Career. neuronline.sfn.org. en. 2020-03-28.
  16. Web site: Courtney Miller Scripps Research. www.scripps.edu. en. 2020-03-28.
  17. Web site: Michael Oldstone, Courtney Miller Named 2015 TSRI Outstanding Mentors. www.scripps.edu. 2020-03-28.
  18. Web site: Courtney Miller Scripps Research. www.scripps.edu. en. 2020-03-30.

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