2026 PRF Webinar Series: Pain and Peptides

Dr. Ru-Rong Ji is the William Maixner Professor of Anesthesiology and Director of the Center for Translational Pain Medicine at Duke University School of Medicine. He also holds professorships in Neurobiology, Cell Biology, and Immunology. Dr. Ji earned his PhD from the Shanghai Institute of Physiology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, and completed postdoctoral training at Peking University, the Karolinska Institute, and Johns Hopkins University. Prior to joining Duke, he served on the faculty at Harvard Medical School (MGH and BWH) for more than a decade. Dr. Ji has mentored over 100 scientists, many of whom now lead independent research laboratories worldwide. He serves on the editorial boards of Anesthesiology, Pain, Journal of Pain, Journal of Neuroscience, Journal of Clinical Investigation, and Physiological Reviews. His laboratory investigates GPCR- and glial cell–mediated signaling mechanisms underlying the development and resolution of pain.

Dr. Donald Iain MacDonald is a postdoctoral fellow in the Sensory Cells and Circuits Lab at the National Center for Complementary and Integrative Health (NCCIH), National Institutes of Health (NIH). He graduated from the University of Oxford in 2015 with a B.A. in Cell and Systems Biology, and then earned a Ph.D. in Neuroscience from University College London in 2020, supervised by Prof. John Wood. He came to the NIH in 2021 to work with Dr Alex Chesler and is currently investigating how nociceptors use different neuropeptides to control pain and inflammation. His work is supported by a Branco Weiss Fellowship and a HEAL Initiative Pathway to Independence Award (K99/R00).

Dr. Bradley K. Taylor is a Professor at the Department of Anesthesiology & Perioperative Medicine and the Center for Neuroscience at the University of Pittsburgh, and the Pittsburgh Center for Pain Research. He completed his PhD at the University of California, San Diego, and his postdoctoral training with Dr. Allan Basbaum at the University of California, San Francisco. Dr. Taylor is the recipient of the NIH First Independent Research Support and Transition Award and the NIH Independent Scientist Award K02 from NIDA. His research area involves studying neuropeptidergic NPY mechanisms of chronic pain, underlying mechanisms of acute to chronic pain transition, as well as understanding the molecular neurobiology of pain sensitization and opioid dependence. His work has been continuously funded by the NIH since 1999 and includes a history of multiple R01s as Principal Investigator. He has published over 120 peer-reviewed research and review articles, including senior-author articles in Science and Nature. He is also serving on the editorial boards of several high-impact journals, chaired numerous symposia at domestic and international meetings, and served on dozens of NIH study sections.

Dr. Paramita Basu earned her Ph.D. in Molecular Biology from Texas Woman’s University (TWU), where she trained under the mentorship of Drs. Dayna L. Averitt and Camelia Maier. Her doctoral research focused on identifying novel phytochemicals from the Texas native plant Euphorbia bicolor with potential as non-opioid therapeutics for pain management. Following completion of her Ph.D., Dr. Basu joined the Department of Anesthesiology and Perioperative Medicine at the University of Pittsburgh and the Pittsburgh Center for Pain Research as a postdoctoral fellow under the mentorship of Dr. Bradley K. Taylor. She was subsequently promoted to Research Assistant Professor within the same department. Dr. Basu’s current research is centered on elucidating the mechanisms underlying chronic postsurgical and neuropathic pain and identifying therapeutic strategies to mitigate chronic pain. She has authored original research articles, review papers, and book chapters, with publications appearing in journals including Anesthesiology, Journal of Neuroscience, JCI Insight, Pain Reports, European Journal of Pharmacology, Frontiers in Pharmacology, and Nutrients. Her work has been recognized with several honors, including the Society for Neuroscience Trainee Professional Development Award, the International Association for the Study of Pain Sex, Gender, Race, and Pain Special Interest Group Best Paper Award, and the U.S. Association for the Study of Pain Best Poster Presentation in Basic Science Award at its Annual Scientific Meeting. Dr. Basu currently serves as co-chair of the Acute to Chronic Pain Special Interest Group and as an early-career contributor to the Pain Research Forum. She also serves as an ad hoc reviewer for numerous biomedical science journals and as a review editor for Frontiers in Pain Research.