Lab News

July 2026

Cecilia Mazzola joins the lab as a research specialist! Cecilia recently finished her MSc in mechanical engineering at the Politecnico di Milano. Welcome!

Tristan Tuazon joins the lab as a PhD student! Tristan received his BS in neurobiology from UCSD and worked as a research assistant in Kay Tye’s lab at the Salk Institute. Welcome!

Chris receives a Klingenstein Fellowship Award in Neuroscience!

January 2026

Chris receives an R00 award from the NIH BRAIN Initiative!

The Zimmerman Lab is officially open!

June 2025

Chris accepts a tenure-track position as an Assistant Professor in the Department of Neurobiology at the University of Utah!

Press and Media

How does your brain know which food made you sick?
By Rachel Watson
Hate cilantro or anchovies? Evolutionary science could explain why
By Olivia Ferrari
Associative learning: A mechanism for conditioned taste aversion
By Matthew Carter, Williams College
Mouse brains hint at why it’s so hard to forget food poisoning
By Elise Cutts
How the brain remembers what gave you food poisoning
By Dan Vahaba
It must be something I ate — How the brain learns what made you sick
By Alison Cranage
Brain region critical for coping with chronic stress identified in mice
By Meenakshi Asokan
‘It must be something I ate’ is hard-wired into the brain
By Angie Voyles Askham
Cosyne Main Meeting talk recording (Session 3: Learning)
Scientific American, Sep 2022
Your body has a clever way to detect how much water you should drink every day
Society for Neuroscience, Oct 2020
Society for Neuroscience presents Lindsley Prize to Kiah Hardcastle and Christopher Zimmerman
Naked Neuroscience Podcast, Oct 2020
How does thirst work in the brain?
Inverse, Oct 2020
Scientists discover the origin of thirst in the brain
Eppendorf, Oct 2020
Research on thirst wins 2020 Eppendorf & Science Prize
AAAS, Oct 2020
Real-time signals from body to brain help regulate sensation of thirst
Fred Hutchinson Cancer Center, Mar 2020
Fred Hutch announces 2020 Harold M Weintraub Graduate Student Award recipients
Nature Reviews Gastroenterology & Hepatology, Apr 2019
A thirst-quenching gut–brain signal
National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute, Mar 2019
Your gut controls your thirst and keeps your brain informed
Inscopix, Mar 2019
A gut check tells the brain about thirst
NPR, Mar 2019
Blech! Brain science explains why you’re not thirsty for salt water
HHMI, Mar 2019
Thirst controlled by signal from the gut
UCSF, Mar 2019
Had enough water? Brain’s thirst centers make a gut check
Cell, Nov 2016
Firing up in anticipation
Nature, Sep 2016
Forecast for water balance
Nature Podcast, Aug 2016
Scientists quench a decades-old question about thirst
STAT, Aug 2016
Thirsty? Your brain knows before you do
BBC, Aug 2016
Brain’s thirst circuit ‘monitors the mouth’
UCSF, Aug 2016
New understanding of thirst emerges from brain study