Benedict C. Albensi

Dr. Benedict C. Albensi, Ph.D., BCMAS, CRQM is a Professor and Chair of the Department of Pharmaceutical Sciences. He is best known for his work with factors involved in ageing, cognition, and Alzheimer’s disease (AD), such as nuclear factor kappa B (NF-kB), a mediator of inflammation, but also a required molecule for memory.

He obtained his Ph.D. in Neuroscience from the University of Utah’s Medical School in 1995. Subsequently, he was awarded a Postdoctoral Fellowship at Georgetown University in Washington, DC, working with Drs. Faden and Pekar, where he developed MRI methods for investigating head trauma and cognition. He then went on to work as a Postdoctoral Scholar with Dr. Mark Mattson, at the Sanders-Brown Center on Aging – University of Kentucky where he was the first to show NF-kB is required for hippocampal synaptic plasticity in mammals. Other appointments have included the Cleveland Clinic, NPS Pharmaceuticals, Pfizer, Case Western Reserve University, St. Boniface Hospital Research Ctr., and the University of Manitoba. He has also been a board director or advisor for several groups, including MitoCanada, Alzheimer’s Society of Manitoba, Brain Injury Association of Manitoba, and the Toronto Dementia Research Alliance.

Over the last few years, his work has largely focused on mitochondrial dysfunction in AD. Recently, the Albensi lab has shown very early deficits and sex-based differences in mitochondrial function before the appearance of plaques and tangles, the classic hallmarks of AD. He has been ranked in www.Expertscape.com as being in the top 1% worldwide in several areas (2012-2022) for his number of publications in Alzheimer Disease (0.30%), neurocognitive disorders (0.43%), dementia (0.57%), NF-kappa B (0.043%), memory (0.59%), mitochondria (0.88%), and energy metabolism (0.28%).