Division of Biology and Medicine
Center on the Biology of Aging

Robert A. Reenan, PhD

Professor of Biology, Department of Molecular Biology, Cell Biology and Biochemistry

Biography

Evolution of brain function and behavior, neurodegeneration, RNA editing, ncRNAs, chromatin, Parkinson's disease

Dr. Reenan is an international leader in the area of eukaryotic gene regulation, and his laboratory has played a seminal role in understanding the process of RNA editing. His multidisciplinary approaches have spanned cutting-edge genetics and molecular biology, comparative genomics, computer modeling, and biophysical techniques in order to bring to light the biological importance of ancient and conserved regulatory processes. The Reenan lab's work has been funded by NIH, NSF, Ellison Medical Research Foundation, the CART fund for Alzheimer's Research, and the Cambridge Templeton Consortium's Emergence of Biological Complexity program. In the past few years Dr. Reenan has published research in journals such as Science, Nature, Cell, Neuron, and Nature Structural and Molecular Biology, as well as being highlighted in several of these journals in mini-reviews or "editor's choice" articles. Dr. Reenan's work was one of twelve groups highlighted in the FY2005 Budgetary Request to Congress by NIH-NIGMS.