Welcome to the Slug Lab

Welcome, to the online home of Dominican University’s Slug Lab.

Slug Lab logo, a cute aplysia californica

Here you will find all the usual stuff for a lab website (lab personnel, posts about recent papers, etc.). In addition, this site hosts resources from our recent sequencing efforts for Aplysia californica:

Below is the blog roll for the lab, with musings, news, publications, etc.

 

SlugLab Alum Carys McFaul wins the Mulroy!

News
Students
Congrats to SlugLab alum Carys McFaul, who has been awarded Dominican’s Mulroy Excellence Award, the highest honor for a graduating senior! Carys will speak at commencement…
May 8, 2026
 

SlugLab in the News!

News
Publications
Students
The most recent paper from the SlugLab was written up by The Transmitter:
May 8, 2026
 

Where have you gone, early transcriptional changes?

News
Publications
Publications - Bob
Publications - Irina
▼ Publications - Students
The slug lab has a new paper out, again with student co-authors (Tania Rosiles and Melissa Nguyen, congrats!):
Mar 30, 2026

SlugLab Triumph – Carys McFaul wins 1st place at the 2026 cSFN Poster Competition

News
Students
Last week the SlugLab carried on the annual tradition of attending the Chicago Society for Neuroscience meeting. It’s a wonderful regional meeting — great keynote speakers…
Mar 9, 2026

Beyond the SlugLab – DU Neuro major presentation at the 2025 International Neuropsychological Society meeting

News
Students
▼ Publications - Students
For over a decade the SlugLab has been a proving ground for Dominican University STEM majors to gain hands-on experience conducting neuroscience research. But we’re not the…
Mar 14, 2025

SlugLab Wedding Bells

News
Students
This past weekend was a milestone for the SlugLab — Irina and I attended the wedding of honorary Sluglab alum Catherine (Cat) Klostermann who tied the knot with Ryan Fagan…
Oct 17, 2024

SlugLab at SFN 2024

Publications
Students
This year the Society for Neuroscience meeting came to the SlugLab’s backyard: Chicago!
Oct 17, 2024

Sluglab 2024 Summer wrapping up

News
Publications
Students
It’s hard to believe the summer research season has come and gone: 10 weeks of ups, downs, and lots of laughs. Overall, it’s been an incredibly productive summer — we made…
Aug 1, 2024

Looks like we’ll be funded!

News
Publications
Publications - Bob
Publications - Irina
▼ Publications - Students
Doing science isn’t always cheap. The sluglab has been very fortunate to have had multiple rounds of funding from the National Institute of Health to support our research.…
Jul 5, 2024

SlugLab Summer 2024

News
Publications
It’s summer and that means the SlugLab is cooking. This summer we have a great roster of student researchers:
Jul 2, 2024

Latest SlugLab paper now out at eNeuro!

News
Publications
Publications - Bob
Publications - Irina
▼ Publications - Students
The Sluglab’s latest paper is now live at eNeuro! You can find it here: ​(Calin-Jageman et al., 2024)​.
Apr 7, 2024
 

Is forgetting an active process? Some new evidence from Aplysia

News
Publications
Publications - Bob
Publications - Irina
▼ Publications - Students
The SlugLab has a new preprint from a really cool experiment we conducted this summer (2023). Check it out here ​(Calin-Jageman et al., 2023)​: https://osf.io/preprints/psyar…
Dec 19, 2023
 

New Review Article: Transcriptional Mechanisms of Long-Term Sensitization

News
Publications
Publications - Bob
Publications - Irina
▼ Publications - Students
Psychologists and neuroscientists have long been fascinated by memory: how do we learn and carry with us new skills and memories? One key insight is that lasting memories…
Dec 12, 2023

End of summer celebration

News
Students
Last week, the SlugLab celebrated the successful wrap up of the Summer 2023 research season.
Aug 8, 2023

SlugLab Representing at the PUMA-STEM Conference

News
Students
At the end of July, PUMA-STEM scholars Zayra Juarez and Leslie Valdez had the opportunity to attend the PUMA-STEM summer research conference and present their summer projets…
Aug 8, 2023

Guess what?

News
Students
I am not a robot, that’s what!
Aug 8, 2023

Summer 2023 in the SlugLab

News
Students
It’s summer, and that means it is once again time for the sluglab to roar into action. As usual, we have a great set of junior scientists, a new batch of burning research…
May 12, 2023

SlugLab at the 2023 Chicago Society for Neuroscience Meeting

News
Publications
Students
The SlugLab was in full force at the 2023 meeting of the Chicago Society or Neuroscience.
Mar 6, 2023

Happy Holidays!

News
Students
Yesterday (12/14) was our slug lab and neuroscience holiday party. Please ignore the fact that we had food in the lab; focus instead on the festive fun time (complete with a…
Dec 15, 2022

PUMA-STEM Poster Session

News
Students
Yesterday, two Slug lab members had their first chance to present their ongoing research projects, premiering their work at the 2022 PUMA-STEM summer research conference:
Aug 9, 2022

Sluglab 2022 – Summer Photos

News
DU school photographer Ryan Pagelow stopped by this week to immortalize the intense work the Sluglab has been conducting this summer (thanks, Ryan!). Here are some cool…
Aug 4, 2022

Summer of ’22 — The SlugLab Roaring Back to Life

News
Students
It’s July of 2022 and for the past 2 months the SlugLab has been lurching back into life.
Jul 27, 2022

The Sluglab is back!

News
Students
Today we received a shipment of Aplysia–the first shipment we’ve had since February of 2020.
Oct 13, 2021
 

Research lemonade: RRR on the short-term benefits of emotional reappraisal interventions in an online context

Publications - Bob
When the pandemic hit, all in-person research was shut down at Dominican (of course). This left a real challenge in terms of trying to figure out how our psychology majors…
Sep 15, 2021

What is forgetting? Slug lab provides some new insights!

Publications - Bob
Publications - Irina
▼ Publications - Students
Today, the SlugLab can share an exciting new paper, with contributions from Tania Rosiles, Melissa Nguyen, Monica Duron, Annette Garcia, George Garcia, Hannah Gordon, and…
Nov 10, 2020
 

What psychology instructors should know about Open Science and the New Statistics

Publications - Bob
Beth Morling and I (Bob) have a new commentary out in Teaching of Psychology that provides an overview of the Open Science and New Statistics movements and gives some advice…
Feb 27, 2020
 

SFN 2019 for the Slug Lab

Students
We’ve just wrapped up a great Society for Neuroscience conference for the slug lab. This year’s meeting (2019) was held right here in Chicago, which provided lots of…
Oct 23, 2019

Sluglab 2019 – It will be an unforgettable summer

News
Students
It’s summer and the slug lab is rocking. We have 8 students working in the lab (!), and a number of really exciting projects.
Jun 5, 2019

Updated word search and mirror-tracing tasks for Qualtrics

News
Publications - Bob
I finally had some spare time to document and post the mirror tracing and word-search tasks I developed for some replication work my students and I completed ​(Cusack…
May 17, 2019

Kids, Neurons, and Robots

News
Publications - Bob
At the end of February I (Dr. Bob) visited a local elementary school as part of the Oak Park Educational Foundation’s Science Alliance Program.
Mar 19, 2019

SlugLab Alum Derek Stek heading to medical school with a full ride scholarship

News
Students
Graduates of the sluglab have been moving on to amazing careers. So we were excited to get the news that lab alumni and neuroscience major Derek Stek has just been offered a…
Mar 8, 2019

The remarkably long-lasting fragments of memory

News
Publications - Irina
▼ Publications - Students
It was a whirlwind 2018. Irina and I are just now catching our breath and finding some time to update the lab website.
Jan 8, 2019
 

New preprint on the very long-lasting transcriptional response to learning

News
Publications - Irina
▼ Publications - Students
The sluglab has a new preprint out, currently under review at the Neurobiology of Learning and Memory. We shows that both transcription and savings can persist for as long…
Aug 18, 2018
 

Slug Lab Video – Our students rock!

News
Students
Our DU media lab spent a bit of time in the lab this summer talking to students and documenting their work. Here’s the video; really great footage of our amazing students.
Aug 18, 2018
 

SlugLab Glamour Shots

News
Here’s the 2018 Summer Slug Lab in action
Aug 8, 2018

When you forget

News
Students
Quanta Magazine recently ran a feature article on the nature of forgetting.  The piece covers several new lines of research on forgetting, including the work we’ve been…
Aug 8, 2018

DU Connections and a New Slug Home

News
Students
The slug lab is kicking off summer research with a brand new aquarium and mixing station for housing Aplysia.  It’s a great upgrade and an even better story that involves…
May 30, 2018

Slug Lab 2018 – Summer Edition

News
Students
Summer is here, so the Slug Lab is running full speed.
May 30, 2018

Slug Lab Triumph! First place in the cSFN undergraduate poster competition for Leticia Perez and Ushma Patel

News
Students
So pleased and proud to announce that Leticia Perez and Ushma Patel have won first place in the Chicago Society for Neuroscience undergraduate poster competition.   Congrats…
Apr 2, 2018

Memories fade..but something remains

News
▼ Publications - Students
Most long-term memories are ‘forgotten’–meaning that it becomes harder and harder to recall the memory.  Psychologists have long known, though, that forgetting is complex…
Dec 15, 2017

Workshop at the Society for Neuroscience Meeting

Publications - Bob
This year was a big year for our lab at the Society for Neuroscience conference.  Leticia Perez, who has been in the lab for the past two summers, gave an amazing talk on…
Nov 25, 2017

An unforgettable experience talking about forgetting

News
Students
▼ Publications - Students
Wow! Our lab just returned from the 2017 Society for Neuroscience meeting.  It was the typical maelstrom of neuroscience–with more than 20,000 neuroscientists bustling about…
Nov 16, 2017

Slug Lab – Distinguished Service Awards from the Faculty for Undergraduate Neuroscience

News
Publications - Irina
At this year’s Society for Neuroscience meeting, Irina and I were honored for our contributions to the Faculty for Undergraduate Neuroscience (FUN).  Specifically, we were…
Nov 14, 2017

The New Statistics for Neuroscience Education.

News
Publications - Bob
This summer I (Bob) was asked to write a series of perspective pieces on statistical issues for the Journal of Undergraduate Neuroscience.
Nov 1, 2017
 

Getting Started with the New Statistics – A talk at Indiana University

News
Publications - Bob
This fall I (Bob) was invited to give a talk at Indiana University as part of a series on good science and statistical practice organized by the university’s Social Science…
Oct 1, 2017

Maintaining Memories, Changing Transcription

News
Publications
Publications - Bob
Publications - Irina
Students
▼ Publications - Students
Under the right circumstances, a memory can last a lifetime.  Yet at the molecular level the brain is constantly in flux: the typical protein has a half-life of only a few…
Sep 15, 2017
 

Red, Romance, and Replication – Cross posted with thenewstatistics.com

News
Publications - Bob
I (Bob) have a new replication paper out today, a collaboration with DU student Elle Lehmann (Lehmann & Calin-Jageman, 2017).  The OSF page for the paper with all the…
Aug 21, 2017
 

APS Workshop on Involving Undergraduates in Replications

Publications - Bob
I had the pleasure of presenting with Geoff Cumming, John Grahe, and Fiona Fidler at this year’s APS meeting on the topic of involving students in replication projects…
Jun 22, 2016

APS Presentations

Publications - Bob
Students
▼ Publications - Students
APS was in Chicago this year, so the replicators I have been supervising were out in full force.
Jun 22, 2016
 

Moral Perfection via Neuroscience?

Publications - Bob
This is a talk I gave at the 2013 Caritas & Veritas symposium at Dominican University. It’s about the quest to use technology to control morality, and covers some early…
May 10, 2016

ITNS

Pre-Order Now: Introduction to the New Statistics

News
Publications - Bob
Can a statistics textbook change the world? Maybe yes! At least that’s the aspiration behind Introduction to the New Statistics: Estimation, Open Science and Beyond, a new…
Apr 27, 2016
 

Rest easy — organic food probably does not make you into a jerk…

News
Publications - Bob
Students
My student Eileen Moery and I have a new paper out today in Social Psychology and Personality Science. It’s a replication paper that I’m quite proud of [cite…
Mar 19, 2016

grant

Grant Awarded to study the mechanisms of sensitization maintenance and decay

News
Students
Woot! The Slug Lab has just been awarded a 3-year R15 grant from NIH to study the transcriptional mechanisms of sensitization memory and decay. What does that mean? It means…
May 26, 2015
 

What’s the best way to teach methods and statistics?

Publications - Bob
No easy answer, but I’m co-author on a new paper that has some hints [cite source=’doi’]10.1177/0098628315573139[/cite]. Well, actually, it’s just a summary of some…
May 26, 2015
 

New Publication on ERIN, Educational Resources in Neuroscience

Publications - Bob
Just after I started at Dominican in 2007 I had the good fortune to team up with Richard Olivo to help in the development of ERIN, an online curated database of educational…
May 26, 2015
 

Qualtrics Tips – A HTML5 and JavaScript Word-Search Task

Publications - Bob
Update – all the code is now posted to github:
Mar 10, 2015
 

Qualtrics Tips – A HTML5 and JavaScript Mirror-Tracing Task

Publications - Bob
**UPDATE**
Mar 10, 2015
 

2014×3 – Transcriptional correlates of long-term habituation

News
Publications - Bob
Publications - Irina
▼ Publications - Students
Third paper of the year for the lab (gasp!) is now out in Learning and Memory [cite source=’doi’]10.1101/lm.036970.114[/cite].
Dec 16, 2014
 

Sluglab Strikes Again – New paper tracing dynamics of learning-induced changes in transcription

News
Publications
Publications - Bob
Publications - Irina
Students
▼ Publications - Students
A nice way to wrap up 2014–we have a new paper out [cite source=’pubmed’]25486125[/cite] where we trace learning-induced changes in transcription over time and over…
Dec 12, 2014

SFN Round 14 – Kicking a** and taking numbers

News
Students
The Sluglab went to Washington D.C. for the 2014 Meeting of the Society for Neuroscience. This is either the 13th or 14th time Irina and I have been. Despite the mileage, we…
Nov 12, 2014
 

New Publication – Microarray analysis of sensitization

News
Publications
Publications - Bob
Publications - Irina
Students
▼ Publications - Students
We’ve got a new paper out [cite source=’pubmed’]25117657[/cite] with the first of what we hope will be a series of studies using microarray to track the transcriptional…
Aug 24, 2014
 

Registered Replication In Social Psychology – Our contribution and amazing special issue

Publications - Bob
Tracy Caldwell and I have a new paper out which we’re very proud of [cite source=’doi’]10.1027/1864-9335/a000190[/cite]–a registered replication of a previous finding that…
May 12, 2014

IMAG0774

Travel award for Gerry Holmes!

News
Students
Congratulations, Gerry!  Junior DU student, bio major, and all-around Slug Lab superstar won a Faculty for Undergraduate Neuroscience Travel Award to attend this year’s…
Jan 27, 2014

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In the news…

News
Our lab has had a couple of great write-ups in the local news:
May 27, 2013
 

An Aplysia Egr homolog is rapidly and persistently regulated by long-term sensitization training

Publications
▼ Publications - Students
Cyriac A, Holmes G, Lass J, Belchenko D, Calin-Jageman RJ, Calin-Jageman IE
Apr 6, 2013
 

Harmonin enhances voltage-dependent facilitation of Cav1.3 channels and synchronous exocytosis in mouse inner hair cells

Publications - Irina
Gregory FD, Pangrsic T, Calin-Jageman IE, Moser T, Lee A
Jan 22, 2013
 

Transcriptional changes following long-term sensitization training and in vivo serotonin exposure in Aplysia californica

Publications
▼ Publications - Students
Bonnick K, Bayas K, Belchenko D, Cyriac A, Dove M, Lass J, McBride B, Calin-Jageman IE, Calin-Jageman RJ
Oct 9, 2012
 

Glutamate transporters EAAT4 and EAAT5 are expressed in vestibular hair cells and calyx endings

Publications - Irina
Dalet A, Bonsacquet J, Gaboyard-Niay S, Calin-Jageman I, Chidavaenzi RL, Venteo S, Desmadryl G, Goldberg JM, Lysakowski A, Chabbert C
Sep 25, 2012
 

Harmonin inhibits presynaptic Cav1.3 Ca²⁺ channels in mouse inner hair cells

Publications - Irina
Gregory FD, Bryan KE, Pangršič T, Calin-Jageman IE, Moser T, Lee A
Aug 7, 2011
 

Molecular microdomains in a sensory terminal, the vestibular calyx ending

Publications - Irina
Lysakowski A, Gaboyard-Niay S, Calin-Jageman I, Chatlani S, Price SD, Eatock RA
Jan 27, 2011
 

NeuronBank: A Tool for Cataloging Neuronal Circuitry

Publications - Bob
Katz PS, Calin-Jageman R, Dhawan A, Frederick C, Guo S, Dissanayaka R, Hiremath N, Ma W, Shen X, Wang HC, Yang H, Prasad S, Sunderraman R, Zhu Y
Apr 19, 2010
 

Ca(v)1 L-type Ca2+ channel signaling complexes in neurons

Publications - Irina
Calin-Jageman I, Lee A
Feb 7, 2008
 

Altering cAMP levels within a central pattern generator modifies or disrupts rhythmic motor output

Publications - Bob
Clemens S, Calin-Jageman R, Sakurai A, Katz PS
Oct 31, 2007
 

Ca2+-binding proteins tune Ca2+-feedback to Cav1.3 channels in mouse auditory hair cells

Publications - Irina
Cui G, Meyer AC, Calin-Jageman I, Neef J, Haeseleer F, Moser T, Lee A
Oct 18, 2007
 

Potentiation phase of spike timing-dependent neuromodulation by a serotonergic interneuron involves an increase in the fraction of transmitter release

Publications - Bob
Sakurai A, Calin-Jageman RJ, Katz PS
Aug 8, 2007
 

Parameter space analysis suggests multi-site plasticity contributes to motor pattern initiation in Tritonia

Publications - Bob
Calin-Jageman RJ, Tunstall MJ, Mensh BD, Katz PS, Frost WN
Jul 25, 2007
 

Behavioral adaptation of the Aplysia siphon-withdrawal response is accompanied by sensory adaptation

Publications - Bob
Calin-Jageman RJ, Fischer TM
Jan 27, 2007
 

Erbin enhances voltage-dependent facilitation of Ca(v)1.3 Ca2+ channels through relief of an autoinhibitory domain in the Ca(v)1.3 alpha1 subunit

Publications - Irina
Calin-Jageman I, Yu K, Hall RA, Mei L, Lee A
Jan 27, 2007
 

Regulation of the preprotachykinin-I gene promoter through a protein kinase A-dependent, cyclic AMP response element-binding protein-independent mechanism

Publications - Irina
Calin-Jageman IE, Wang J, Bannon MJ
Mar 3, 2006
 

A distributed computing tool for generating neural simulation databases

Publications - Bob
Calin-Jageman RJ, Katz PS
Jan 27, 2006
 

Brain-specific RGS9-2 is localized to the nucleus via its unique proline-rich domain

Publications - Irina
Bouhamdan M, Michelhaugh SK, Calin-Jageman I, Ahern-Djamali S, Bannon MJ
Jan 27, 2004
 

Temporal and spatial aspects of an environmental stimulus influence the dynamics of behavioral regulation of the Aplysia siphon-withdrawal response

Publications - Bob
Calin-Jageman RJ, Fischer TM
Jan 27, 2003
 

Synaptic augmentation contributes to environment-driven regulation of the aplysia siphon-withdrawal reflex

Publications - Bob
Calin-Jageman RJ, Fischer TM
Jan 27, 2003
 

Characterization of a chlorella virus PBCV-1 encoded ribonuclease III

Publications - Irina
Zhang Y, Calin-Jageman I, Gurnon JR, Choi TJ, Adams B, Nicholson AW, Van Etten JL
Jan 27, 2003
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