Liviu Bodea

Dr. Liviu-Gabriel Bodea is a Reserach Fellow at the School of Medical Sciences, Faculty of Medicine. He is also affiliated with the Clem Jones Centre in Ageing Dementia Reserach, Queensland Brain Institute, and a former Mid-Career Fellow of Dementia Australia Research Foundation.

Liviu was awarded his Dr.rer.nat. (PhD) title from the University of Bonn, Germany (2014), working in the group of Prof. Harald Neumann, an expert in microglial physiology who identified for the first time a role for the microglial receptor TREM2 (JEM 2005). Liviu then relocated to Australia as the Peter Hilton Early Career Fellow in Ageing Dementia Research (2014-2019) to conduct work together with Prof. Jürgen Götz, a world-renowned leader in Alzheimer's disease reserach. In 2024, Liviu obtained independent NHMRC founding and moved his work in the laboratory of A/Prof Karin Borges at the School of Biomedical Sciences, where he gains deeper insights into proteostais-induces alterations of cellular metabolism.

Liviu is a brain immune cell biologist focusing on the functional crosstalk between microglia, the main resident immune cells of the brain parenchyma, and the surrounding cell types, both in health and disease. He has significant experience in generating and analysing both in vivo and in vitro models (from stable cell lines and primary cultures to novel genetically modified mice) in combination with various biochemical and molecular techniques, ranging from high-resolution microscopy to de novo proteome pathway analysis and generating novel mouse model through CRISPR gene editing.

Liviu has extensive experience in guiding both undergraduate and postgraduate students into the wonders of scientific research :)

Complete List of Published Work: PubMed Bibliography

Funding and Awards

2024-2027 NHMRC Ideas Grant #2030460 (sole CI, salary and research)

2022-2024 Dementia Australia Research Foundation Mid-Carrier Research Fellowship (salary and research)

2022 The University of Queensland Research Stimulus Fellowship (salary)

2019 Emergency Services Queensland Philanthropic Support (research)

2018-2021 NHMRC Project Grant #1147569 (CIB, salary and research)

2014-2019 Peter Hilton Early Career Research Fellowship in Ageing Dement (salary)

Research Impact, Leadership and Professional Activities

Dr. Bodea attracted >3400 citations (h-index 15 @Google Scholar), including 6 articles with >100 citations (Google Scholar) and 3 Highly Cited Publications (Web of Science). In 2021, Expertscape recognised Dr. Bodea as one of the top-rated researchers in the field of tauopathy, placing him in the top 0.8% of >142k published authors worldwide on tauopathies between 2012 and 2021. His work was cited in 18 patents (5 granted).

Dr. Bodea's work on the microglial TYROBP in late-onset AD (Cell 2013, co-first author, former Highly Cited Publication @Web of Science) represents a milestone in the field, with >1700 citations (Google Scholar). He also revealed the complement-induced neurodegeneration of dopaminergic neurons following peripheral immune stimulation (JNeurosci 2014, first author). More recently, he coordinated studies that centred on the effect of Tau protein (molecule relevant for Alzheimer's disease) on protein synthesis (EMBO J 2019 and Acta Neuropathologica Communications 2021), the use of artificial amino acids and de novo proteome analysis for the investigation of memory (eLife 2020) and microglial physiology (STARProtocols 2023), and the role of neuronal PTEN enzyme in synaptic engulfment by microglia (Acta Neuropathologica 2020). He published authoritative reviews in the Journal of Neurochemistry (2017), Nature Reviews Neurology (2018), Nature Reviews Neuroscience (2018), and Brain Research Bulletin (2021).

Dr. Bodea acts as a grant reviewer for MS Research Australia (since 2019), Alzheimer’s Australia Dementia Research Foundation (since 2016) and NHMRC (since 2021). He was the Lead Guest Editor for a Special Research Topic in Frontiers in Cellular Neuroscience (2023), is a member of the Reviewer Board for Frontiers in Cellular Neuroscience and was a member of the Reviewer Board for the International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, Mental Health section. He is an ad-hoc reviewer for various top-tier publications, ranging from Science to Trends in Cell Biology.

Dr. Bodea has mentored and supervised the daily activity of PhD students (2 completed, 1 current), Honours students (4 completed, all awarded First Class distinctions), 2 research assistants, and >10 undergraduate students. His PhD students successfully received various awards (e.g., the Alistair Rushworth Fellowship, Merk-QBI Best Student Publication Award, Best Oral Presentation Award). Both his completed PhD students continue with academic careers: Dr. Joey Benetatos, following a successful post-doctoral training in the Fraenkel Lab (MIT, USA), is currently pursuing his second post-doctoral position in the Prof. Loren Looger group (UCSD, USA), and Dr. Harrison T Evans is holding an Alzheimer's Association Postdoctoral Fellowship and is the Leon Levy Fellow in the Prof. Eric Klann lab (NYU, USA).