Dr. Andrea Bedini

Dr. Andrea Bedini is currently Assistant Professor in the Department of Pharmacy and Biotechnology at the University of Bologna, Italy. Dr. Bedini obtained his MSc degree in Medical Biotechnology with honors and immediately after he was admitted as PhD student at the University of Bologna where he got his PhD degree in Cellular and Molecular Biotechnology in three years and without standing grades from the evaluation committee. He then continued his pathway toward independence In Dr. Spampinato’s lab as a post-doc.Andrea became Assistant Professor at 32 years and Associate at 42 (both achievements are of note considering Italian university system). On March 2023 Andrea got the National Habilitation to full professor, that opened him the road towards the next professional goals. Andrea’s research has initially focused on investigating transcriptional modulation of MOR expression in neuronal and immune cells. Within these research activities, Andrea joined the Department of Pharmacology and Toxicology, University of Magdeburg where he worked under the supervision of Prof. Volker Hoellt and Dr. Juergen Kraus. Then, Andrea expanded his interests towards the analysis of opioid receptor signaling and function in different in vitro cellular models and to the characterization of innovative opioid ligands at MOR and KOR. To further widen his expertise, Andrea then joined Prof. Charles Chavkin lab at the Department of Pharmacology, University of Washington (Seattle, USA), where he got proficient in investigating ligand-directed signaling and in performing detailed molecular pathway analysis of MOR and KOR expression and function. The high level reached by Andrea and the quality of his contribution to the field of molecular and cellular opioid pharmacology is confirmed by the prestigious EU-funded Horizon 2020 grant that he obtained in 2019 as team leader of the University of Bologna unit (research project still ongoing). Considering the Italian and European scenario, it is of note to get this kind of grants as PI at this relatively young age (under 40 Assistant Professor). Moreover, Andrea was approached to be part of the international, multidisciplinary consortium that conceived, drafted and obtained such H2020 grant only due to his scientific contribution to the molecular and cellular mechanisms of opioid receptors and ligands (and not in light of previous cooperations with consortium partners or any connection to past PIs or more senior mentors). Andrea authored 35 publications on peer reviewed journals and 7 chapters in books, 38 oral presentations (of which 1 selected in Young Investigator Symposium, 8 selected as hot topic, 15 invited) and 51 poster presentations at scientific meetings. He has also received national and international grants, both as Co-I and as PI, with a notable continuity from 2007 to present day. Andrea is also a dedicated professor and mentor: he has been teaching multiple classes at both undergraduate and post-graduate courses at University of Bologna for more than ten years now has mentored an impressive number of students (100 at the MSc in Pharmacy, more than 20 at BSc and MSc in Biotechnology). Moreover, he mentored (as final thesis advisor) 2 post-graduate Specialization School students and co-mentored 4 PhD students.

Last, but not the least, Andrea has been an active INRC member for more than fifteen years now: he attended his first INRC in 2006 (St. Paul, MN, USA) and since then he attended more than 10 INRC annual meetings both in Europe and US. Andrea actively participated to INRC meetings giving oral talks (invited at INRC2010; selected as hot topicatINRC2007, INRC2016 and INRC2019) and poster presentations (INRC2006, INRC2010, INRC2012, INRC2014, INRC2017, INRC2021, INRC2022),and being invited as panelist at the round table on Academic and industry career at INRC2020.Andrea was also recipient INRC travel awards in 2010 and 2012, was nominated for Executive Committee elections at INRC2016 and INRC2017 and was elected in INRC Executive Committee as European representative at INRC2019 (and he is currently serving as Executive Committee member).