Marija Kundakovic

Dr. Marija Kundakovic is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Biological Sciences at Fordham University. She received a PhD in Biochemistry & Molecular Genetics from the University of Illinois at Chicago, and completed her postdoctoral training at Columbia University and the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai in New York City. In 2015, she was awarded a NARSAD Young Investigator Award by the Brain & Behavior Research Foundation and established her own research laboratory at Fordham University. Dr. Kundakovic has been at the forefront of the psychiatric epigenetics research since her early career, and her lab focuses on hormonal and environmental factors driving sex differences in depression, anxiety disorders, and drug abuse. The Kundakovic lab recently discovered a sex-specific epigenetic regulation in the female brain as a function of the ovarian cycle, providing a new molecular framework to study the female-specific susceptibility to psychiatric disorders. Dr. Kundakovic’s research is funded by the National Institutes of Mental Health.

Education

• University of Illinois Chicago
  Doctor of Philosophy (Ph.D.), Biochemistry and Molecular Genetics

• School of Medicine, University of Belgrade, Serbia
  Master of Science (M.Sc.), Experimental Pharmacology

• School of Pharmacy, University of Belgrade, Serbia
  Doctor of Pharmacy (Pharm.D.), Pharmacy

SELECTED PUBLICATIONS

Kundakovic M. Sex-specific Epigenetics: Implications for Environmental Studies of Brain and Behavior. Curr Environ Health Rep. In Press.

Kundakovic M and Jaric I (2017). The Epigenetic Link between Prenatal Adverse Environments and Neurodevelopmental Disorders. Genes 8, 104.

Kundakovic M (2017). Fearing the Mother's Virus: The Lasting Consequences of Prenatal Immune Activation on the Epigenome and Brain Function. Biol Psychiatry. 81(3):e23-e25.

Kundakovic M, Jiang Y, Kavanagh D, Dincer A, Brown L, Pothula V, Zharovsky E, Park R, Jacobov R, Magro I, Kassim B, Wiseman J, Dang K, Sieberts SK, Roussos P, Fromer M, Harris B, Lipska BK, Peters MA, Sklar P, and Akbarian S (2017). Practical Guidelines for High-resolution Epigenomic Profiling of Nucleosomal Histones in Postmortem Human Brain Tissue. Biol Psychiatry 81(2):162-170.

Peter CJ*, Fischer LK*, Kundakovic M*, Garg P*, Jakovcevski M, Dincer A, Amaral AC., Ginns EI, Galdzicka M, Bryce CP, Ratner C, Waber DP, Mokler D, Medford G, Champagne FA, Rosene DL, McGaughy JA, Sharp AJ, Galler JR, Akbarian S (2016). DNA methylation signatures of early childhood malnutrition associated with impairments in attention and cognition. Biol Psychiatry 80(10):765-774. *equal contribution

Nestler EJ, Pena CJ, Kundakovic M, Mitchell A, and Akbarian S (2016). Epigenetic basis of mental illness. Neuroscientist 22(5):447-63.

The PsychENCODE Consortium, Akbarian S, Liu C, ..., Kundakovic M, ..., Senthil G, Lehner T, Sklar P, Sestan N (2015). The PsychENCODE Project. Nat Neurosci. 18(12):1707-1712.

Braithwaite EC, Kundakovic M, Ramchandani PG, Murphy SM, and Champagne FA (2015). Maternal prenatal depressive symptoms predict infant NRC31 1F and BDNF IV DNA methylation. Epigenetics. 10(5):408-17.

Kundakovic M, Gudsnuk K, Herbstman JB, Tang D, Perera FP, Champagne FA (2015). DNA methylation of BDNF as a biomarker of early life adversity. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 112(22):6807-13.

Kundakovic M and Champagne FA (2015) Early Life Experience, Epigenetics, and the Developing Brain. Neuropsychopharmacology 40(1):141-53.

Kundakovic M (2014) Postnatal risk environments, epigenetics, and psychosis: putting the pieces together. Soc Psychiatry Psychiatr Epidemiol. 49(10):1535-6.

Kundakovic M, Lim S, Gudsnuk K, Champagne FA (2013) Sex-specific and strain-dependent effects of early life adversity on behavioral and epigenetic outcomes. Front Psychiatry 4:78.

Kundakovic M, Gudsnuk K, Franks B, Madrid J, Miller RL, Perera FP, Champagne FA (2013) Sex- specific epigenetic disruption and behavioral changes following low-dose in utero bisphenol A exposure. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A 110(24): 9956-61.

Kirkbride JB, Susser E, Kundakovic M, Kresovich JK, Davey Smith G, and Relton CL (2012) Testing epigenetic factors as mediating prenatal nutritional influences on schizophrenia risk. Epigenomics 4: 303-15.

Kundakovic M and Champagne FA (2011) Epigenetic perspective on the developmental effects of bisphenol A. Brain, Behavior, and Immunity 25: 1084-93.

Grayson DR, Kundakovic M, and Sharma RP (2010) Is there a future for histone deacetylase inhibitors in the pharmacotherapy of psychiatric disorders? Mol Pharmacol 77: 126-35.

Kundakovic M, Chen Y, Guidotti A, and Grayson DR (2009) The reelin and GAD67 promoters are activated by epigenetic drugs that facilitate the disruption of local repressor complexes. Mol Pharmacol 75: 342-54.

Guidotti A, Dong E, Kundakovic M, Satta R, Grayson DR, and Costa E (2009) Characterization of the action of antipsychotic subtypes on valproate-induced chromatin remodeling. Trends Pharmacol Sci 30:55-60.

Kundakovic M, Chen Y, Costa E, Grayson DRH. (2007) DNA Methyltransferase Inhibitors Coordinately Induce Expression of the Human Reelin and Glutamic Acid Decarboxylase 67 Genes. Mol Pharmacol 71: 644-53.

Grayson DR, Chen Y, Costa E, Dong E, Guidotti A, Kundakovic M, Sharma RP.H (2006) The human reelin gene: transcription factors (+), repressors (-) and the methylation switch (+/-) in schizophrenia. Pharmacol Ther 111:272-86.

Mitchell CP, Chen Y, Kundakovic M, Costa E, Grayson DRH (2005) Histone deacetylase inhibitors decrease reelin promoter methylation in vitro. J Neurochem 93:483-92