Drs. Cappuccio, Meyer-Schuman and Jing receive 2025 Zoghbi Scholar Awards

Congratulations to the 2025 Zoghbi Award Winners! 

Dr. Gerarda Cappuccio was awarded First Place for her project entitled, “Mitochondria as Cellular Sensors of Bioenergetic State and Cell Fate.”

Dr. Cappuccio's research explores how problems in the cell’s energy centers—mitochondria—affect brain development in autism and rare genetic diseases. Using patient-derived brain organoids (tiny 3D brain models grown in the lab), she aims to understand how disrupted energy balance contributes to developmental challenges and to help guide more precise treatments.

Drs. Rebecca Meyer-Schuman and Junzhan Jing were both awarded Second Place prizes for their projects, "Cis-regulatory Elements of Dosage-sensitive Genes and Their Role in Neurodevelopmental Disorders" and "Molecular Dissection of Bushy Cell Subtypes in Auditory Processing," respectively.

Dr. Meyer-Schuman's project will (1) define cis-regulatory elements (CREs) that regulate dosage-sensitive neurodevelopmental (NDD) genes and (2) test how autism-associated variants in CREs for the NDD gene RAI1 alter CRE activity. This work will begin refining the noncoding search space for deleterious mutations in autism and other neurodevelopmental disorders.

Dr. Jing's project aims to uncover how two molecularly distinct bushy cell types in the ventral cochlear nucleus encode sound localization cues. Using new genetic mouse lines, we will trace where these neurons project and test how silencing each type affects hearing tasks. This study will establish the first molecular–functional correspondence of bushy cells, thereby advancing our understanding of auditory processing and disorders such as tinnitus and auditory neuropathy.