Shahrdad Lotfipour, Ph.D.

Biography

Shahrdad Lotfipour, Ph.D., is Associate Professor with tenure in the Departments of Emergency Medicine, Pharmaceutical Sciences, and Pathology and Laboratory Medicine at the University of California, Irvine School of Medicine. He received his Ph.D. in Anatomy and Neurobiology from the University of California, Irvine in 2007, following a Fulbright Fellowship at the University of Queensland in Brisbane, Australia. Lotfipour completed postdoctoral training at the University of Nottingham in the United Kingdom and at UCLA, where he held a T-32 NIMH fellowship and a Tobacco Related Disease Research Program fellowship before serving as Assistant Research Neuroscientist.

Lotfipour directs the University of California Behavioral Neuroscience Testing Core, a facility he helped establish with nearly $2 million in equipment and infrastructure support from the university. His research focuses on the molecular and genetic mechanisms underlying adolescent substance use, with particular emphasis on nicotinic acetylcholine receptors and their role in addiction. He has secured over $5 million in extramural funding as principal investigator, including multiple grants from the Tobacco Related Disease Research Program and the National Institutes of Health. His work examines how genetic variants, particularly in the CHRNA6 gene, influence vulnerability to nicotine addiction and subsequent use of other substances including methamphetamine, cocaine, and opioids.

Lotfipour is an elected Fellow of the Center for the Neurobiology of Learning and Memory at UC Irvine and an elected member of the Chao Family Comprehensive Cancer Center. He serves on the NIH Early Career Reviewer Program and has been a member of multiple NIH study sections. He has mentored over 100 undergraduate students, 15 graduate students, and numerous postdoctoral fellows, with his trainees receiving competitive national fellowships including Ford Foundation, NSF, and NIDA T32 awards. He received the 2019 Chancellor's Award for Excellence in Undergraduate Research Mentorship and was selected as a TEDxUCIrvine speaker in 2021.

Education

• B.A. in Arts and Humanities, University of California, Irvine, 2000
• M.MSci. in Pharmacy, University of Queensland, 2001
• Ph.D. in Anatomy and Neurobiology, University of California, Irvine, 2007

Distinctions

• United States Fulbright Fellowship, University of Queensland, 2000-2001
• NIH Early Career Reviewer Program, Center for Scientific Review, National Institutes of Health, 2017-present
• Phi Beta Kappa, University of California, Irvine, 2000
• NARSAD Young Investigator Award, Brain and Behavior Research Foundation, 2011-2013
• Brain and Behavior Research Foundation Young Investigator Award, 2014-2017
• Top Abstract Award, Society for Research on Nicotine and Tobacco, 2022
• Ono Pharma Foundation Breakthrough Science Initiative Awards Program Finalist, 2022
• Elected Member, Chao Family Comprehensive Cancer Center, 2024-present
• TEDxUCIrvine Selected Speaker, 2021
• Elected Fellow, Center for the Neurobiology of Learning and Memory, University of California, Irvine, 2019-present