Ivana Grakalic, PhD

Since joining the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism in 2007, Dr. Grakalic has promoted and expanded the basic behavioral research program within Division of Neuroscience and Behavior (DNB) by developing initiatives on learning and motivational aspects of alcohol use disorder (AUD). In addition, she participates in several trans-NIH initiatives, including the NIH BRAIN Initiative, the NIH HEAL Initiative, the NIH Basic Behavioral and Social Science Opportunity Network (OppNet), and the NIH-Wide Sex as a Biological Variable (SABV) Working Group. She is also NIAAA’s liaison to the Office of Research on Women's Health (ORWH) and a member of NIH Coordinating Committee on Research on Women’s Health (CCRWH). Most recently, she has served as a co-editor for a special issue of Alcohol Research: Current Reviews dedicated to research on alcohol-related sex differences across a spectrum of outcomes and measures including cognition, psychiatric comorbidities, cancer, cardiovascular disease and sleep disorders. The issue highlighted critical and ongoing sex-specific knowledge gaps in our understanding of the epidemiology of alcohol use, the interplay of physiology and alcohol, and best approaches to prevention and treatment.