Mary Anne O'connell PhD

Dr. Mary Anne O´Connell was born in Ireland where she obtained a Bachelor of Science (Hons) degree in Microbiology at the University College Galway. She then moved Stateside and obtained both a Master of Science degree and Ph.D. in Molecular Biology at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine under the supervision of Prof. Lucy Shapiro. Dr. O´Connell is currently the European Research Area Chair in RNA and Immunity at the Central European Institute of Technology (CEITEC) located in Brno, Czech Republic.

Previously, she held appointments as Instructor at the Department of Cellular Biology at the University of Basel, Group Leader at the Medical Research Council Human Genetics Unit, Edinburgh, and, more recently, as a Visiting Professor at Stockholm University. Dr. O´Connell focuses on RNA editing, particularly the conversion of adenosine to inosine. Because the cell machinery reads the converted adenosine as a guanosine, a modified RNA often has a different fate than its unmodified counterpart.