Claudia Vargas
Assistant Professor Life & Earth Sciences- Education
Ph.D., Neuroscience, 2014
Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, New York, NY
BS, Cum Laude with High Honors in Genetics, 2002
University of Georgia, Athens, GA
- Specializations
Neuroscience, Molecular and Cellular Biology, Epigenetics
- Biography
Dr. Claudia Vargas has been a faculty member at Georgia State University since 2015. She earned her BS from the University of Georgia, with a research focus in genetics. Upon graduation, Dr. Vargas worked in a human genetics research lab at Emory University and a physiology lab at Augusta University. Dr. Vargas completed her Ph.D. in Neuroscience at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai in New York, NY, where she conducted research on the epigenetic and behavioral effects of prenatal cannabis exposure. Dr. Vargas instructs various courses at Perimeter College, including Molecular Biology, Cell Biology, Anatomy, Physiology, and Neuroscience. Dr. Vargas currently lives in Atlanta, GA, with her two very adored, school-aged children and far too many house plants.
Dr. Vargas is an Associate Faculty in the Neuroscience Institute.
- Publications
Randall J Ellis, Anissa Bara, Claudia A Vargas (co-first author), Amy L Frick , Eddie Loh, Joseph Landry, Teddy O Uzamere, James E Callens, Qammarah Martin, Prashanth Rajarajan , Kristen Brennand, Aarthi Ramakrishnan, Li Shen, Henrietta Szutorisz, Yasmin L Hurd. Prenatal Δ9-Tetrahydrocannabinol Exposure in Males Leads to Motivational Disturbances Related to Striatal Epigenetic Dysregulation. Biol Psychiatry. 2021 Sep 27:S0006-3223(21)01629-2. doi: 10.1016/j.biopsych.2021.09.017. PMID: 34895699
Giuseppe Tortoriello, Claudia V Morris, Alan Alpar, Janos Fuzik, Sally L Shirran, Daniela Calvigioni, Erik Keimpema, Catherine H Botting, Kirstin Reinecke, Thomas Herdegen, Michael Courtney, Yasmin L Hurd, Tibor Harkany. “Miswiring the brain: 9-tetrahydrocannabinol disrupts cortical development by inducing an SCG10/stathmin-2 degradation pathway.” EMBO J. 33(7) (April 2014) pp. 668-685.
Claudia V Morris, Jennifer A Dinieri, Henrietta Szutorisz, Yasmin L Hurd. “Molecular mechanisms of maternal cannabis and cigarette use on human neurodevelopment.” Eur J Neurosci. 34(10) (November 2011) pp.1574-83.
Yanhua Ren, John Whittard, A Higuera-Mata, Claudia V Morris, Yasmin L Hurd. "Cannabidiol, a nonpsychotropic component of cannabis, inhibits cue-induced heroin seeking and normalizes discrete mesolimbic neuronal disturbances." J Neurosci 29(47) (November 2009) pp.14764-14769.
Juliet S Chhay, Claudia A Vargas, TJ McCorvie, Judith L Fridovich-Keil, DJ Timson, “Analysis of UDP-galactose 4'-epimerase mutations associated with the intermediate form of type III galactosaemia,’ J Inherit Metab Dis. 31(1) (Febuary 2008) pp. 108-16.
Edson F Nogueira, Claudia A Vargas (co-first author), Me´lissa Otis, Nicole Gallo-Payet, Wendy B Bollag and William E Rainey, “Angiotensin-II acute regulation of rapid response genes in human, bovine, and rat adrenocortical cells,” JME 39 (October 2007) pp.365-374.
Kimberly K Openo, Jenny M Schulz, Claudia A Vargas, CS Orton, MP Epstein, RE Schnur, F Scglia, GT Berry, GS Gttesman, C Ficicioglu, SE Slonim, RJ Schroer, C Yu, VE Rangel, J Keenan, K Lamance, JL Fridovich-Keil. “Epimerase-deficiency galactosemia is not a binary condition,” American Journal of Human Genetics 78(1) (January 2005) pp. 89-102 .
Ai-min Li, Claudia Vargas, Melissa A Brykailo, Kimberly K Openo, Anita Corbett, and Judith Fridovich-Keil, “Both KH and non-KH domain sequences are required for polyribosome association of Scp160p in yeast,” Nucleic Acids 32 (September 2004) pp. 4768-4775.
Bryce Mendelsohn, Ai-min Li, Claudia Vargas, Kristen Reiman, Alice Watson and Judith Fridovich-Keil, “Genetic and biochemical interactions between SCP160 and EAP1 in yeast,” Nucleic Acids 31 (September 2003) pp. 5838-5847.
Zheng Xu, Britton Lance, Claudia Vargas, I. Budak Arpinar, Eileen Kraemer, Krys J. Kochut, John A. Miller, Jeff R. Wagner, Michael J. Weise, John K. Wunderlich, James Stringer, George Smilian, Melanie T. Cushion and Jonathan Arnold, “ODS3: A Tool for Mapping by Sequencing,” Genetics 163 (April 2002) pp. 1299-1313.