UW Researchers Receive NSF Award to Explore How Brain Regulates Temperature Through Social Behavior

Maintaining a stable body temperature is essential for survival. Animals, including humans, use both autonomic processes -- such as shivering or activating brown fat -- and behaviors -- such as seeking warmth or huddling together with others -- to stay warm.

While much is known about how the brain controls automatic responses to cold, the neural mechanisms underlying behavioral thermoregulation remain poorly understood. This is especially true for huddling, a behavior commonly used by mice, particularly females, to share warmth.

Two University of Wyoming faculty members aim to uncover the identity and function of neurons in the hypothalamus and brainstem that are active during huddling behavior, thanks to a National Science Foundation (NSF) grant.

Adam Nelson and Nicole Bedford, both associated with the UW Department of Zoology and Physiology, received a three-year research award, in the amount of $425,000, for a project titled “BRC-BIO: Molecular identity and function of neuronal cell types underlying social thermoregulation.” BRC-BIO stands for Building Research Capacity in Biology. The grant begins Aug. 1 and continues through July 31, 2028.

Nelson and Bedford will serve as the grant’s co-principal investigators. Two UW students and a recent UW graduate also will participate in the work as part of the grant. They are Samantha Killmer, a senior from Portage, Mich., majoring in biology and Spanish; Kinley Solem, a junior from Gillette, majoring in biology; and Trevor Rasmuson, a spring 2025 graduate from Buffalo with a bachelor’s degree molecular biology.

“This project gives us a unique opportunity to build research capacity in neuroscience at UW while tackling a fundamental biological question: how the brain links social behavior with body temperature regulation,” Nelson says. “By focusing on the oxytocin system, we hope to uncover new insights into how the brain coordinates physiology and behavior to maintain homeostasis.”

“We’re thrilled to continue this undergraduate-driven neuroscience project at the University of Wyoming,” Bedford adds. “By studying how the brain integrates social and physiological cues to regulate body temperature, our students will gain hands-on research experience while contributing to important discoveries with broad implications.”

Their research will focus on a set of brain regions known to regulate temperature and social behavior, including the dorsomedial hypothalamus and the rostral medullary raphe. A key focus is the role of oxytocin receptor-expressing neurons, which are traditionally associated with prosocial behavior but also may have a central role in regulating body temperature, Nelson and Bedford say.

Using advanced genetic, imaging and molecular techniques, the research will investigate how specific brain cell types contribute to both social behavior and thermoregulation. In doing so, the project will lay the groundwork for a new, integrative understanding of how the brain coordinates behavior with bodily needs -- a topic with broad relevance to mental health and homeostasis.

The mouse is the foremost mammalian animal for understanding human health and disease, Nelson says.

This research builds on three Nelson-Bedford papers published previously in the journals Communications Biology, Neuroscience and Biobehavioral Reviews, and BioRxiv.

Additionally, this grant will support educational initiatives aimed at enhancing neuroscience training and research capacity at UW. The grant will provide immersive lab experiences and research training for UW undergraduates and outreach opportunities for high school students from rural and underserved communities, with the aim to diversify the STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics) pipeline in Wyoming and beyond.