Date of Graduation:  1978               

Graduate Degree:  Ph.D. in Pharmacology from the LSU Medical Center School of Graduate Studies

Date of Graduation: 1984

Place of Employment:  Department of Pharmacology, Toxicology & Neuroscience at the LSU Health Sciences Center in Shreveport     

Position:  Professor and Head

How I got to LSUS:  I spent my first semester at the Baton Rouge campus of LSU.  I returned to Shreveport to be closer to family.  There were also fewer distractions in Shreveport so that I could concentrate on my studies more effectively.

Memories of LSUS:  LSUS was a lot smaller when I attended.  The Student Union/Snack Shack was a small metal building, as was the book store.  However, the instructors really cared about their students and that truly mattered to me.

LSUS faculty who helped me:  The two major influences on me were Robert (Bob) Benefield, who really turned me on to Psychology in the first place, and Mark Vigen, who pointed me in the direction of psychopharmacology.  I am still conducting psychopharmacological research to this day.  Dr. Vigen also made me aware that there was a graduate school at the LSU Medical School in Shreveport.  That was very fortunate!

How LSUS helped me succeed:  LSUS effectively prepared me for graduate school.  While graduate school was significantly more intense than my studies as an undergraduate, I was able to quickly evolve my study habits to successfully complete my post graduate education and obtain my Ph.D. in Pharmacology.  I then went on to successfully complete a postdoctoral fellowship at The Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine in the Department of Neuroscience.  I also was a staff fellow at the Addiction Research Unit at the National Institute on Drug Abuse.  I credit LSUS with much of my academic successes.

What I do now:  I am a full Professor and Head of the Department of Pharmacology, Toxicology & Neuroscience at the LSU Health Sciences Center in Shreveport.

About my job: This gets rather complicated.  As Head of the Department, I am responsible for the day-to-day administrative activities of the department and the departmental faculty.  I also serve on numerous institutional committees involved in the operational activities of the Health Sciences Center.  Our department is responsible for teaching pharmacology, how drugs work, to medical and graduate students at the Health Sciences Center.  We discuss the drugs approved for each medical condition, how they work and what side effects are produced.  I am also a scientist with an active research program, which is the reason I choose this career.  My research involves the neurobehavioral biology of addiction, which means that we study the effects of addictive drugs on the brain and behavior.  In particular, we investigate the effects of stress on addiction.  This research has been supported by NIH grants since 1986, and I am considered one of the leaders in the field.  Through this research, we have identified potential medications that reduce the ability of environmental triggers to promote craving and relapse to drug use in abstinent drug addicts.  I recently founded and incorporated a biotechnology company, Embera NeuroTherapeutics, Inc., to conduct clinical trials of the effectiveness of our medications on cocaine and nicotine addiction.  Thus, I was able to translate the results of basic research from my lab into potential medications for the treatment of addiction.  This was always my intention - for the fruits of my work to help people.

Advice to college-bound students: Have an open mind about what you want to do with your life.  If you have wanted to be a doctor or lawyer or teacher or engineer for as long as you can remember, then stay the course.  But if you really are unsure, then keep your options open.  I did not identify my career directions until I was in my junior year.

Advice to someone who wants to enter my field: My son, James Goeders, graduated from LSU in Baton Rouge in the spring of this year.  He is currently a Pharmacology graduate student at Emory University in Atlanta.  The most important thing I told him, and that I tell my students and anyone else who wants to enter my field, is not to be a sheep!  In other words, if you want to be a scientist, don't do what everyone else is doing.  Don't just go after the hot new molecule of the year like everyone else.  Use your imagination!  Be an individual!  That is how the really important discoveries are made.

Tips on choosing a major or career: Choose a career that involves something that interests you.  To a degree, job satisfaction outweighs salary considerations.  If you choose a career that interests you, you'll be amazed that you get paid for the work that you do.

My toughest professional challenge: Balancing administrative responsibilities with my research.  If I could, I would be in the lab every day running experiments as I did when I was a graduate student.  But my responsibilities do not allow that, so I have to be content with the data generated by the wonderful students and staff in my lab.

My toughest personal challenge: Learning how to leave work at work!

Successes (honors, awards, etc.) in my life:

• My first research publication was in the scientific journal, Science, the premier scientific journal in all of science, while I was still a graduate student in 1983.
• Who's Who Among Students in American Universities and Colleges, 1984.
• Chancellor's Award to the Outstanding Student, Louisiana State University School of Medicine, 1984.
• 1985 Travel Award Recipient - American College of Neuropsychopharmacology Annual Meeting.
• 1986 Travel Award Recipient - The Committee on Problems of Drug Dependence Annual Meeting.
• My research has been funded by NIH since 1986.  Prior to this, I received individual NIH grants to support my research as a graduate student and postdoctoral fellow.
• Fellow - American Psychological Association - 1996, Division 28:  Psychopharmacology and Substance Abuse.
• I have served on a large number of grant review study sections for NIH, the VA and the Department of Defense.
• Rotating Scholar - Center for Advanced Studies in the Behavioral Sciences, Stanford University, October 16-20, 2000.
• College on Problems of Drug Dependence, Board of Directors 2001-2005, Chair, Publications Committee 2003 - 2006, Nominations Committee 2004-2005
• 2000, 2001 Nominee for the Alan A. Coping award for excellence in teaching, Louisiana State University Health Sciences Center.
• I have been invited to speak across the United States and in Europe, Asia and South America about my research.  I am considered one of the leaders in the field of stress and addiction.

I've learned this from life: Choose a career that interests you.  Don't be a sheep.  Treat everyone with respect.  Follow your heart.

What I'd be doing if I had all the time in the world:  I cannot see myself doing anything else.  I still cannot believe that they pay me to do what I do.