Appointments

• Co-Director, Basic & Translational Biomedicine Graduate Program
• Assistant Professor (Tenure Track), College of Graduate Studies
• Considine Scientist, Rebecca D. Considine Research Institute at Akron Children’s Hospital

Bio

I hold a B.A. in Neuroscience from the College of Wooster and proudly earned both my M.S. and Ph.D. through NEOMED’s Basic and Translational Biomedicine Program (f.k.a Integrated Pharmaceutical Medicine Program) specializing in sensory neurobiology.

During my time at NEOMED, I’ve had the privilege of teaching Neuroscience, Human Anatomy & Physiology, and Research Principles to bright and driven students across the medical, pharmacy, and graduate programs. I currently serve as the Program Director for Basic & Translational Biomedicine Graduate Program with the goal of developing the next generation of transformational scientists, scholars or innovators in the health sciences.

As a member of the Neurogenerative Disease & Aging Research Focus Area at NEOMED. My research explores understanding the neurobiological mechanisms that disrupt eye-brain communication in neurodegenerative injury and disease.

Area of Expertise

• Neurodegenerative Disease/Injury (Traumatic Brain Injury, Glaucoma, Alzheimer’s)
• Sensory neurobiology (Visual System)
• Neuroanatomy
• Neuropharmacology
• Human anatomy & physiology
• Research design and analysis (for both basic animal research and clinic-based human subjects populations)
• Epifluorescence and Electron Microscopy
• Small animal surgery

Education

• Ph.D. in Integrated Pharmaceutical Medicine, NEOMED, 2017
• M.S. in Integrated Pharmaceutical Medicine, NEOMED, 2014
• B.A. in Neuroscience, The College of Wooster, 2012

Courses

• Human Physiology (I & II) (Anesthesiology Assistants, COGS, NEOMED)
• Human Anatomy and Pathophysiology (I & II) (Pharmacy, COP, NEOMED)
• Foundations of Neuroscience (Graduate, COGS, NEOMED)
• Research Writing (Medical, Pharmacy, Graduate, COGS, NEOMED)
• Research Methods (Medical, Pharmacy, Graduate, COGS, NEOMED)
• Biomedical Microscopy and Image Analysis (Graduate, COGS, NEOMED)
• Drug Discovery and Approval (Medical, Pharmacy, Graduate, COGS, NEOMED
• Basic and Translational Biomedicine Seminar Series (Graduate, COGS, NEOMED)
• Academic Immersion Scholars Program (Medical, Akron Children’s Hospital)

Distinctions

• Graduate Faculty Advising Status College of Graduate Studies

Awards

• 2024 & 2025 University Hospitals-NEOMED Faculty Scholar
• 2022 Junior Faculty Award

Academic and professional activities

• University Faculty Council
• Graduate Faculty Council
• Institutional Biosafety Committee (Chair)
• COGS Committee on Academic and Professional Progress (Vice-Chair)
• NEOMED Alumni Board
• Dual Degree Society-Student Group (Advisor)

Presentations

• Assessing the morphology of intrinsically photosensitive retinal ganglion cells after mild traumatic brain injury. Akron Children’s Hospital. October 15th, 2019
• Axonopathy and Synaptopathy in Glaucomatous Neurodegeneration. Presented at the College of Wooster, Wooster, Ohio. November 30th, 2017
• From Boutons to Bulbs: Exploring Fluorescent and 3D Electron Microscopy to Examine Axonopathy and Synaptopathy in Mouse Models of Glaucoma. Presented at Microscopy of Northeast Ohio spring meeting at John Carroll University, Cleveland, Ohio. May 18th, 201

Publications

• Smith MA, Plyler ES, Dengler-Crish CM, Meier J., and Crish SD (2018). Nodes of Ranvier in glaucoma. Neuroscience 390: 104-118. PMID: 30149050
• Harun-Or-Rashid M., Pappenhagen N, Palmer PG, Smith MA, Gevorgyan V, Wilson GN, Crish SD, Inman DM (2018). Structural and Functional Rescue of Chronic Metabolically Stressed Optic Nerves through Respiration. Journal of Neuroscience 8(22): 5122-5139. PMID: 29760184
• Dengler-Crish CM, Smith MA, Wilson GN. (2017). Early evidence of low bone density and decreased serotonergic synthesis in the dorsal raphe of a tauopathy model of Alzheimer’s disease. Journal of Alzheimer’s disease. 55(4): 1605–1619. PMID: PMC5181667.
• Smith MA, Xia CZ, Dengler-Crish CM, Fening KM, Inman DM, Schofield BR, Crish SD (2016). Persistence of intact retinal ganglion cells terminals after axonal transport loss in the DBA/2J mouse model of glaucoma. Journal of Comparative Neurology. 524(17):3503-3517. PMID: 27072596.
• Dengler-Crish CM, Smith MA*, Inman, DM, Young JW, Wilson GN, Crish SD (2014). Anterograde transport blockade precedes deficits in retrograde transport in the visual projection of the DBA/2J mouse model of glaucoma. Frontiers in Neuroscience. 8:290 PMID: 25278826