Joanne Chia is interested in studying how genes and the environment affect the brain and behaviour.
When she was pursuing her PhD, she made genetic modifications to the gene encoding the neuropeptide relaxin-3a in zebrafish, to examine how it could affect responses to stress and anxiety-like behaviour. When she did her postdoctoral fellowship with the Lee Kong Chuan School of Medicine, Nanyang Technological University, she investigated how bacteria released from fish skin could elicit fear behaviours (the alarm response) in zebrafish.
Through her research, she aims to better understand the molecular mechanisms and neural circuitry of emotional states such as stress, fear and anxiety, and how they produce behaviours in the human context.
Chia obtained both her Bachelor of Science and PhD from the National University of Singapore.
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