Stephanie Cragg


Stephanie J. Cragg is a British physiologist who is Professor of Neuroscience at the University of Oxford. She holds a joint appointment as Professor in the Department of Physiology, Anatomy and Genetics, University of Oxford and as a Fellow, Director of Studies and Tutor for Medicine at the college Christ Church, Oxford.

Early life and education

Cragg studied Natural Sciences at Clare College, University of Cambridge, followed by a DPhil in neuropharmacology at the Department of Pharmacology, University of Oxford and Lincoln College, Oxford. Her graduate supervisors were Baroness Professor Susan Greenfield and Dr Margaret Rice.

Research and career

Cragg is a neuroscientist at the University of Oxford. In her early postdoctoral research career, she was an E.P. Abraham Junior Research Fellow at St. Cross College, then an E.P. Abraham Research Fellow at Keble College, then received a Beit Memorial Fellowship followed by a Paton Research Fellowship from the Department of Pharmacology, University of Oxford. She was a visiting scientist at New York University Depts of Physiology & Biophysics, and Neurosurgery, and at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
Her work focusses on understanding the functioning in health and disease of the brain's dopamine circuits and related cell types that become dysregulated in Parkinson's disease, addictions and other neurological and neuropsychiatric disorders. This work focusses particularly on the regulation of dopaminergic transmission.
Cragg's work includes the study of how dopamine release in the striatum is regulated by other neuronal pathways and neuromodulators, including the neurotransmitters acetylcholine, GABA, adenosine, and dysregulation in Parkinson's disease. Some of her most cited work relates to the axonal regulation of dopamine transmission by acetylcholine, cholinergic interneurons and nicotinic acetylcholine receptors.

Scientific leadership

Scientific journals

Societies

Engagement with scientific societies include:

Keynote lectures