Ryan Boudreau, PhD, graduated summa cum laude with a BS in genetics, cell biology and development from the University of Minnesota – Twin Cities, where he studied cellular trafficking of neurodegenerative disease-related proteins for his honor’s thesis under the guidance of Dr. Harry Orr. In the following years, Dr. Boudreau completed his PhD in molecular physiology and post-doctoral training at the University of Iowa in the laboratory of Dr. Beverly Davidson. During this time, he investigated gene silencing for specific application of treating dominantly inherited brain diseases and understanding of the fundamental biology of microRNA-mediated gene silencing in humans.

Dr. Boudreau was awarded the Lori C. Sasser Foundation Fellowship in 2008 and a NIH T32 Training Fellowship in 2010. Thus far, he has published seven first-author original research articles, including his most recent work aimed at comprehensively identifying and defining microRNA binding sites in human brain. Dr. Boudreau now holds a faculty position at the University of Iowa, where his research team is investigating the impacts of microRNA functions in Parkinson’s disease.