Dr Alaa Abdul-Ridha
PhD

Dr Alaa Abdul-Ridha is a molecular pharmacologist with a special interest in cell-surface proteins called G protein-coupled receptors (GPCRs). Her research career has focused on GPCR drug discovery for CNS diseases.

Alaa completed her PhD in 2015 at Monash University under the supervision of Professor Arthur Christopoulos and Dr Meritxell Canals, where she focused on allosteric targeting of the muscarinic M1 receptor. In 2016, Alaa received an NHMRC Dementia Research Development Fellowship and joined the group of Associate Professor Daniel Scott within the Neurotherapeutics Theme at The Florey. Together with the expertise of the Drug Discovery Innovation Group, Alaa employs multidisciplinary scientific approaches to develop novel selective small molecules and nanobodies against GPCRs for the treatment of various CNS disorders.