Staci Bilbo

Staci Bilbo is an American neuroimmunologist and The Haley Family Professor of Psychology and Neuroscience at Duke University. Bilbo also holds a position as a research affiliate at Massachusetts General Hospital overseeing research within the Lurie Center for Autism. As the principal investigator of the Bilbo Lab, Bilbo investigates how environmental challenges during the perinatal period impact the immune system and further influence brain development, cognition, and affective behaviors later in life.

Education Bilbo completed her undergraduate degree in psychology and biology at the University of Texas at Austin. She received her Bachelor of Arts in 1998, graduating with high honors.

After her undergraduate degree, Bilbo joined the lab of Randy Nelson at Johns Hopkins University. Bilbo completed her master's degree in 2000 and continued on to complete a PhD in Neuroendocrinology in Nelson's lab. and another on how sex hormones impact immune function in male and female Siberian Hamsters in 2001. In 2002, Bilbo published a first author paper in the Proceedings of the Royal Society showing the effect of shortening photoperiods on the immune response of Siberian hamsters. Following this finding, Bilbo explored how photoperiods predict environmental conditions and immune trafficking in anticipation of infection. In 2002 Bilbo published a paper on the importance of melatonin in regulating immune response. In 2003, Bilbo published a paper on the sex differences in immune responses to photoperiod modulation.

Career and research After completing her graduate work, Bilbo pursued her postdoctoral work in neuroimmunology at the Center for Neuroscience at the University of Colorado in 2003. In 2007, Bilbo was appointed to assistant professor of psychology and neuroscience at Duke University. Bilbo remained on the faculty at Duke, leading the Developmental Neuroimmunology Lab until 2016. During her time at Duke, Bilbo investigated neuroimmune interactions in brain development, and the effect of neonatal infection on glial cell biology and immune functions later in life.

In 2016, Bilbo joined the faculty at Harvard Medical School and became the Lurie Family Associate Professor of Pediatric and Neuroscience as well as the director of research for the Lurie Center for Autism at the Massachusetts General Hospital for Children. She also studied the effect of environmental pollutant exposure during critical periods of prenatal development on metabolic, behavioral, and neuroinflammatory developments in adult offspring. In 2018, Bilbo and her lab studied the role of microglia in the regulation of social behavior in adolescent rats. Following these findings, Bilbo wrote a review paper highlighting the understudied connections between the immune system, social behavior, and dopaminergic circuitry.

Bilbo returned to Duke in July 2019 to hold the title of Haley Family Professor of Psychology and Neuroscience while still collaborating with the Lurie Center and other researchers in Boston. Bilbo is also actively involved in outreach in the Duke community and recently gave a talk geared towards raising the visibility of female scientists and to encourage female participation in STEM.

Awards and honors

2013 – Bass Connections Team Leader – Brain and Society Theme 2013 – Glenn Hatton Lecture – UC Riverside Center for Glial-Neuronal Interactions 2011 – Frank Beach Young Investigator Award, Society for Behavioral Neuroendocrinology 2010 – Robert Ader New Investigator Award, PsychoNeuroImmunology Research Society 2010 – Duke Institute for Brain Sciences Research Incubator Award 2002, 2004, 2005 – PsychoNeuroImmunology Research Society Travel Award 2003 – Women in Neuroscience Travel Award 2002 – American Psychological Assoc. Science Directorate Dissertation Research Award 1998 – Graduation with Honors and Special Honors in Psychology, The University of Texas

Select publications Bilbo, SD, Levkoff, LH, Mahoney, JH, Maier, SF Rudy, JW, Watkins, LR. (2005) Neonatal infection induces memory impairments following an immune challenge in adulthood. Behavioral neuroscience 119 (1), 293 Bilbo, SD, Biedenkapp, JC, Der-Avakian, A, Rudy, JW, Watkins, LR. (2005) Neonatal infection-induced memory impairment after lipopolysaccharide in adulthood is prevented via caspase-1 inhibition. Journal of Neuroscience 25 (35), 8000-8009 Bilbo, SD, Bowers, SL, Dhabhar, FS, Nelson, RJ. (2008) Stressor-specific alterations in corticosterone and immune responses in mice. Brain, behavior, and immunity 22 (1), 105-113 Bilbo, SD, Schwarz, JM. (2009) Early-life programming of later-life brain and behavior: A critical role for the immune system. Frontiers in Behavioral Neuroscience, 3, 14, 1–14. Bilbo, SD, Tsang V. (2010) Enduring consequences of maternal obesity for brain inflammation and behavior of offspring. The FASEB Journal 24 (6), 2104-2115 Bilbo, SD, Mistry, RS, Smith, SH, Sholar, PW, Williamson, LL. (2011) Microglia and memory: modulation by early-life infection Journal of Neuroscience 31 (43), 15511-15521 Bilbo, SD, Schwarz, JM. (2012) The immune system and developmental programming of brain and behavior. Frontiers in neuroendocrinology 33 (3), 267-286 Bilbo, SD, Sholar, PW, Schwarz, JM. (2012) Sex differences in microglial colonization of the developing rat brain. Journal of neurochemistry 120 (6), 948-963 Block, ML, Elder, A, Auten, RL, Bilbo, SD, Chen, H, Chen, JC. (2012) The outdoor air pollution and brain health workshop. Neurotoxicology 33 (5), 972-984 Bilbo, SD, Schwarz, JM. (2012) Sex, glia, and development: interactions in health and disease. Hormones and behavior 62 (3), 243-253