Lauren E. Kenney, M.S.
Lauren Kenney is a doctoral student in the Neuropsychology and Clinical Neuroscience track of the Department of Clinical and Health Psychology at the University of Florida. She earned her B.S. in neuroscience from Muhlenberg College before working for two years as a clinical research assistant in the neuropsychology program at Rhode Island Hospital. In this position, she split her time between serving as a psychometrist in the clinic and coordinating studies on mind-body interventions for mild cognitive impairment (MCI) and on changes in daily functioning (i.e. medication management) that accompany MCI and dementia. Her current research interests include the influence of methodological variation on how cognitive changes are characterized in Parkinson’s Disease and whether certain methods have greater validity in predicting future decline. For fun, she enjoys traveling, visiting history museums, and attending theatre productions.
Adrianna M. Ratajska, M.S.
Adrianna Ratajska is a doctoral student in the Neuropsychology and Clinical Neuroscience track of the Department of Clinical and Health Psychology at the University of Florida. She received a B.S. in psychology from Union College and worked for 3 years as a research assistant at the Partners Multiple Sclerosis Center at Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston. In this role, she recruited patients, administered cognitive and motor measures, and managed the data for a longitudinal multiple sclerosis research database. Her research interests include mood disorders among patients with neurological disease, as well as protective and risk factors for cognitive impairment. In her free time, she enjoys hiking, riding her bike, and trying new restaurants with friends.
Rachel Schade, M.S.
Rachel graduated from Pitzer College with a degree in neuroscience and minor in movement studies. For her honors thesis, she examined cognitive impairment in patients with Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease. She then gained a Master of Science degree in Neuroscience, Dementia and Neurodegenerative Disease at the University College London. Under Dr. Rimona Weil, she investigated visuoperceptual and visuospatial changes in patients with Parkinson’s Disease via a web-based platform. After graduating with distinction, she worked at UCLA as a research coordinator and neuropsychological rater for the Mary S. Easton Center for Alzheimer’s Disease Research. Rachel then moved to UCSD to pursue her interest of working with and learning from patients with movement disorders. She continued as a research coordinator and neuropsychological rater for clinical research and clinical trials in Movement Disorders under Dr. Irene Litvan. She is excited to continue this work under Dr. Dawn Bowers.
Katie Rodriguez, M.S.
Katie Rodriguez is a doctoral student in the Neuropsychology and Clinical Neuroscience track of the Department of Clinical and Health Psychology at the University of Florida. She earned her B.S. degree in neurobiological sciences at the University of Florida and worked as a research coordinator for five years in a neuropsychology and structural neuroimaging lab at UF. This position allowed her to work with a range of older adult and neurological populations administering neuropsychological assessment. Her research interests include early identification of cognitive decline in individuals with neurodegenerative diseases and racial/ethnic health disparities within the context of aging. In her free time, she enjoys going to the beach, hanging out with her dog, and exploring new places.
Joshua Gertler, M.S.
Josh is a graduate student in the Cognitive Neuroscience Lab at Fixel under the mentorship of Dr. Dawn Bowers. He graduated from the University of Pittsburgh in 2017 with a Bachelor of Science in psychology and a minor in neuroscience. After graduation he stayed on at the University of Pittsburgh PET center as a data analyst for a year, and later returned to his home state of Connecticut to work as a research assistant at the Institute of Living Olin Neuropsychiatry Research Center under for Dr. Michael Stevens. He completed his master’s at UF under Dr. Peter Lang at the Center for the Study of Emotion and Attention. Josh is primarily interested in identifying biomarkers (e.g., fMRI, DTI, sMRI, and Electrodermal Activity) across anxiety and mood disorders that might aid in the development of more targeted treatments. He is especially interested in the new NIMH RDoC initiative which lays out a DSM-free framework for this kind of research.