Tenure-Track Faculty Cluster Hire

IBG is recruiting 2-3 faculty (Assistant or Associate/Full) in statistical genetics, twin and family designs, and computational research. Start date fall 2027. Applications received by October 15, 2026 receive full consideration.

Announcement Associate/Full Professor position Assistant Professor position

Jerry Stitzel

  • Professor
  • INSTITUTE FOR BEHAVIORAL GENETICS
  • INTEGRATIVE PHYSIOLOGY
Address

Institute for Behavioral Genetics
University of Colorado Boulder
447 UCB
Boulder, CO 80309-0447

Graduate student applications

Please check the Department of Integrative Physiology website for information on applying to graduate school. Applications are typically due in November. Additional information is available on IBG's Prospective Students page.

Research Interests:

The use of genetic strategies to identify the underlying biological bases for the behavioral and physiological actions of drugs of abuse with special emphasis on nicotine.

Active Grants:

  • NIDA R01DA044283 (Vrieze, S). Deep sequencing, phenotyping, and imputation in large-scale biobanks: a novel and cost-effective framework to identify rare mutations associated with addiction. Role: Co-investigator
  • AB Nexus Grant (Stitzel, Patel MPI). Multi-generation impact of developmental nicotine exposure on mitochondrial function. Role: Lead PI
  • NIDA 5R33DA055781 (Ehringer, Hoeffer, Stitzel) 9/1/24-8/30/27. Role of glial expression in nicotine behaviors for genes identified through human GWAS. Role: MPI

Additional Resources:

CV

Molecular Neurogenetics Laboratory

 

 

Stitzel Current lab

Stitzel Former Trainees

Jennifer Wilking

Doctoral student

2005-2009

Sheila Maier

Masters student

2006-2008

Tristan McClure-Begley

Doctoral student

2008-2010

Janessa Jacobs

Masters student

2008-2010

William Horton

Doctoral student

2009-2013

Hunter Mathews

Doctoral student

2014-2020

Jordan Buck

Doctoral student

2016-2020

Amanda Alvarado

Masters student

2017-2019

Xiao Li

Postdoctoral trainee

2002-2003

Sharon Mexal

Postdoctoral trainee

2005-2007

Tom Precht

Postdoctoral trainee

2008-2010

Anne Tammamaki

Postdoctoral trainee

2009-2012

Cristian Zambrano

Postdoctoral trainee

2009-2012, 2015-2017

Andre Zalud

Postdoctoral trainee

2011-2014

Rebecca Helfand

Postdoctoral trainee

2011-2014

Peter Dobelis

Postdoctoral trainee

2015-2017

Heidi O'Neill

Postdoctoral trainee

2015-2019

Publications

Stitzel Highlighted Publications

The effects of nicotine on sleep in female C57BL/6J mice

This paper describes the effect of nicotine exposure and withdrawal on sleep in female mice. Compared to a previous study from our lab using male mice, findings of this study indicate that female mice have more profound sleep disruption as compared to male mice during nicotine withdrawal.

(Behavioral Brain Research, 2025)

Investigating the role of nicotinic acetylcholine receptors in menthol's effects in mice

This study examined the role of Chrnb2 and Chrna5 on menthol consumption in mice. Data from our lab demonstrated that mice homozygous for the nicotine dependence risk allele for the human CHRNA5 SNP rs16969968 consumed more menthol by choice than mice homozygous for the reference allele. 

(Drug and Alcohol Dependence, 2024)

Genetic Modifiers of Oral Nicotine Consumption in Chrna5 Null Mutant Mice

In this study, we used Chrna5 knockout mice bred onto a panel of chromosome substitution strains to determine whether there might be genes that can alter the effect of Chrna5 on nicotine consumption. Results indicated that there are likely several genes that can eliminate the effect of Chrna5 deletion on nicotine consumption as well as genes that affect nicotine consumption independent of Chrna5. Because CHRNA5 is associated with nicotine dependence in humans, identification of these Chrna5 modifiers may lead to novel targets for the development of smoking cessation aids.

(Frontiers in Psychiatry, 2021)

Developmental nicotine exposure engenders intergenerational downregulation and aberrant posttranslational modification of cardinal epigenetic factors in the frontal cortices, striata, and hippocampi of adolescent mice

We previously demonstrated that in utero nicotine exposure leads to neurodevelopmental disorder-like behaviors (ADHD, schizophrenia, autism, etc.) and altered brain biochemistry in both the directly in utero-exposed offspring and the unexposed grand-offspring. This study identified changes in several epigenetic factors which may explain the multi-generational effect of in utero nicotine exposure on behavior and brain biochemistry.

(Epigenetics & Chromatin, 2020)

The effects of oral nicotine administration and abstinence on sleep in male C57BL/6J mice

This study was the first study to assess the effect of nicotine withdrawal in an animal model. Results indicated that nicotine withdrawal had little effect on overall sleep time but did lead to sleep fragmentation, a measure indicative of poor sleep quality. These findings are similar to the effect of nicotine withdrawal in humans.

(Psychopharmacology, 2019)

The interaction of the Chrna5 D398N variant with developmental nicotine exposure

This paper describes a series of experiments that demonstrate that the effect of in utero and early post-natal nicotine exposure on adolescent nicotine consumption and striatal dopamine release are impacted by a genetic variant in the nicotinic acetylcholine receptor gene Chrna5. Following developmental nicotine exposure, mice possessing a "risk' variant for nicotine consumption increased nicotine consumption and exhibited reduced striatal dopamine release following developmental nicotine exposure while mice possessing the "non-risk" variant showed substantially reduced nicotine consumption and increased striatal dopamine release. These results suggest that nicotine consumption behavior and brain function are influenced by both genetics and environmental exposures.

(Genes, Brain, and Behavior, 2018)