Azad Bonni

Azad Bonni is a Canadian and American neuroscientist of Kurdish origin. The focus of his research is to understand the mechanisms of neuronal connectivity in the brain. From October 2012 until June 30, 2019, he was the Edison Professor of Neuroscience and Chairman of the Department of Neuroscience at Washington University School of Medicine. He earned his PhD in neuroscience at Harvard University in 1996. Bonni did his Ph.D. and postdoctoral studies in the laboratory of Michael Greenberg between 1992 and 1999, where he discovered signaling mechanisms by which neurotrophic factors, including ciliary neurotrophic factor (CNTF) and neurotrophins, induce transcription and cell differentiation and survival in the nervous system.

He launched his own laboratory in the Department of Pathology at Harvard Medical School in 1999.