Curriculum Vitae: Education: 2000-2003 B. Sc. in Psychobiology, Hebrew University, Jerusalem, Israel. 2003-2005 M. Sc. in Neuroscience, Hebrew University, Jerusalem, Israel. 2005-2010 Ph. D. studies in Neuroscience, Hebrew University, Jerusalem, Israel. 2010-present Postdoctoral fellow at the Medical University of South Carolina, Charleston SC, USA under the supervision of Dr. Peter Kalivas. Honors and Awards 2000-2001 The “Natural Sciences” prize for high grades in high school. 2008 – Travel grant to Society for Neuroscience conference awarded by the Hebrew University, Jerusalem, Israel. 12/2010 – SMART (Selected Monthly ARTicle) prize, Institute of Life Sciences, The Hebrew University, Jerusalem, Israel. 2012 - Medical University of South Carolina Neuroscience Institute International Trainee Fellowship for Postdoctoral Fellows. 12/2012 – Article recommendation in f1000.com by Dr. Kent Berridge 11/2013 – Chair and invited speaker, the minisymposium "The Ventral Pallidum: Roles in Reward and Addiction", 43rd annual meeting of the Society for Neuroscience, San Diego, USA. 02/2014 – Travel award for the 7th FISEB/ILANIT 2014 congress, Eilat, Israel. Professional Memberships 2005-2009 Member, Israeli Society for Neuroscience 2008-Present Member, Society for Neuroscience 2011-Present Member, Molecular and Cellular Cognition Society 2012-Present Member, Israeli Society of Biological Psychiatry Teaching 2012-2013 - Diversity in Science course for graduate students, Medical University of South Carolina – Assistant  Research Interest: Dr. Yoni Kupchik was recently recruited as a senior lecturer by the department of Medical Neurobiology in the Hebrew University. His research focuses on the neurobiological underpinnings of motivated behavior, with an emphasis on addictive behavior and motivated eating. The nucleus accumbens (NAc) and the ventral pallidum (VP) are two interconnected brain regions that are deeply involved in the translation of motivation into action. The once-regarded simple connectivity between these two regions has been recently shown to be more complicated than previously thought, attributing a much more central role for the ventral pallidum in addiction. Using mainly electrophysiological tools combined with behavior, optogenetics, chemogenetics, and immunohistochemistry I try to understand the connectivity patterns between the NAc and the VP and how repetitive use of powerful reinforcers such as drugs or highly-palatable food induces synaptic plasticity in these connections that may turn normal motivated behavior into addiction.