Upcoming:

Nmur1 and Cckar fail to support functional genetic access in adult dopamine neurons and challenge GPCR atlas assignments

https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.64898/2026.05.11.724447v1

A Knock-in Ntsr1-Flp Driver Enables Intersectional and Systemic Targeting of Heterogeneous Midbrain Dopamine Circuits

Fernando Garcia, Andrew P. Villa, Justine T. Wong, Lief E. Fenno, Gina M. Leinninger, Andrew D. Steele

https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.64898/2026.03.11.711093v1

In revision at Cell Reports Methods

Genetic Identification of Dopamine Neurons Required for Circadian Food Anticipatory Activity in Mice

Andrew P. Villa,* Jacqueline Trzeciak,* Damien Wolfe,* David E. Ehichioya,* Jeffrey Falkenstein, Justine T. Wong, Lauren Dimalanta, Wyatt Kaiban, Jaskaran Dhanoa, Gregory Stevens, Fernando Garcia, Lori Scarpa, Chris Chalfoun, Larry S. Zweifel, Rajeshwar Awatramani, Richard D. Palmiter, Martin Darvas, Shin Yamazaki, and Andrew D. Steele

https://www.biorxiv.org/cgi/content/short/2026.03.27.714759v1

Systemic AAV delivery of a calcium indicator in marmosets: functional validation in visual area MT

https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.64898/2026.01.23.701367v1

Social Context Suppresses Food Anticipatory Activity and Associated Thermoregulation in Mice

For a full listing of publications by Andrew Steele, please visit his Google Scholar Profile 

Adeno-associated viral vector papers:

Willows JW, Lazor LM, Gunsch G, Mishra G, Villa AP, Shay TF, Steele AD, and KL Townsend (2026) Targeting the Peripheral Nervous System in Adipose Tissue with Engineered AAV. Cell Reports Methods, in press

Lin C, Chen X, Fan Y, Hoang JD, Ristic F, Fan Y, Chung JH, Sullivan EE, Gawda T, Jang S, Kavvathas B, Tran I, Li Y, Steele AD, Shay TF, and V Gradinaru (2025) AAVs Targeting Human Carbonic Anhydrase IV Enhance Gene Delivery to the Brain. Cell Reports 44(11) 116419 https://doi.org/10.1016/j.celrep.2025.116419

Feeding, activity, and circadian papers:

Farahmand F, Sidikpramana M, Gomez AR, Rivera LJ, Trzeciak JR, Sharif S, Tang Q, Leinninger GM, Güler AD, and AD Steele (2024) Dopamine production in neurotensin receptor 1 neurons is required for diet-induced obesity and increased day eating on a high-fat diet Obesity 32(8): 1448-1452 https://doi.org/10.1002/oby.24066

Tang Q, Assali DR, Güler AD, and AD Steele (2022) Dopamine systems and biological rhythms: Let's get a move on. Front Integr Neurosci. 2022 Jul 27; 16:957193.

Trzeciak J and AD Steele (2022). Studying Food Entrainment: Models, Methods, and Musings. Front. Nutr. 9:998331.

Scarpa L, Wanken B, Smidt M, Mistlberger RE, and AD Steele (2022) Mice hypomorphic for Pitx3 show robust entrainment of circadian behavioral and metabolic rhythms to scheduled feeding. Cell Reports (Matters Arising) 38(2), 109865

Assali DR, Sidikpramana M, Villa AP, Falkenstein J, and AD Steele (2021) Type 1 dopamine receptor (D1R)-independent circadian food anticipatory activity in mice PLoS ONE 16(2): e0242897

Gallardo CM, Martin CS, and AD Steele (2020) Food Anticipatory Activity on circadian time scales is not dependent on central serotonin: evidence from tryptophan hydroxylase-2 and serotonin transporter knockout mice. Frontiers in Molecular Neuroscience 13: 534238

Grippo RM, Tang Q, Zhang Q, Chadwick SR, Gao Y, Altherr ED, Sipe L, Purohit AM, Purohit NM, Sunkara MD, Cios KJ, Sidikpramana M, Spano AJ, Campbell JN, Steele AD, Hirsh J, Deppmann CD, Wu M, Scott MM, AD Güler (2020) Dopamine Signaling in the Suprachiasmatic Nucleus Enables Weight Gain Associated with Hedonic Feeding. Current Biology 30: 1-13

Assali D*, Hsu CT*, Gunapala K, Aguayo A, McBurney M, and AD Steele (2018) Food anticipatory activity on a calorie-restricted diet is independent of Sirt1  PLoS ONE 13(6): e0199586

Aguayo A*, Martin CS*, Huddy TF, Ogawa-Okada M, Adkins JL, AD Steele (2018) Sex differences in circadian food anticipatory activity are not altered by individual manipulations of sex hormones or sex chromosome copy number in mice. PLoS ONE 13(1): e0191373

Michalik M, Steele AD, and RE Mistlberger (2015) A sex difference in circadian food-anticipatory rhythms in mice: Interaction with dopamine D1 receptor knockout. Behav Neurosci 129(3):351-60

AD Steele and RE Mistlberger (2015) Activity is a slave to many masters. eLife 4:e06351

Gallardo CM*, Darvas M*, Oviatt M, Chang C, Michalik M, Huddy TF, Meyer EE, Shuster SA, Aguayo, A, Hill EM, Kiani K, Ikpeazu J, Martinez JS, Purpura M, Smit AN, Paton D, Mistlberger RE, Palmiter R, AD Steele (2014) Dopamine receptor 1 neurons in the dorsal striatum regulate food anticipatory circadian activity rhythms in mice. eLife

Gallardo CG, Hsu CT, Gunapala KM, Parfyonov M, Chang CH, Mistlberger RE, and AD Steele (2014) Behavioral and Neural Correlates of Acute and Scheduled Hunger in C57BL/6 Mice. PLoS ONE 9(5): e95990

Gallardo CM, Gunapala K, King OD and AD Steele (2012) Daily scheduled high fat meals moderately entrain behavioral anticipatory activity, body temperature, and hypothalamic c-Fos activation. PLoS ONE 7(7): e41161

Luby M, Hsu CT, Shuster SA, Gallardo CM, Mistlberger R, King OD and AD Steele (2012) Food anticipatory activity behavior of mice across a wide range of circadian and non-circadian intervals. PLoS ONE 7(5): e37992

Gunapala K, Gallardo CM, Hsu CT and AD Steele (2011) Single gene deletions of orexin, leptin, and neuropeptide Y do not appreciably alter food anticipatory activity induced by caloric restriction. PLoS ONE 6(3):e18377

Gunapala K, Chang D, Hsu CT, Manaye K, Switzer RC and AD Steele (2010) Striatal pathology underlies prion infection-mediated hyperactivity in mice. Prion 4(4): 302-15

Hsu CT, Dollar P, Chang D and AD Steele (2010) Daily timed sexual interaction induces moderate anticipatory activity in mice. PLoS ONE 5(11): e15429

Hsu CT, Patton DF, Mistlberger RE* and AD Steele* (2010) Palatable meal anticipation in mice. PLoS ONE 5(9): e12903

Jhuang H, Garrote E, Mutch J, Yu L, Khilnani V, Poggio T, Steele AD* and T Serre* (2010) Automated home-cage behavioral phenotyping of mice. Nature Communications 1:68

Chen D, Steele AD, Lindquist SL, and L Guarente (2005) Increase in activity during calorie restriction requires Sirt1. Science 310(5754):1641

* These authors contributed equally to this work/co-corresponding authors