On Tuesday, 18 November, Dr Rosalía Rodríguez took up her position as professor in the Department of Biomedical Sciences at UIC Barcelona, in a ceremony held in the Assembly Hall of the General University Hospital of Catalonia, a centre affiliated with the University, which was attended by health professionals, researchers, teachers, colleagues and students from the Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences.
Dr Cristina Monforte, vice-rector for Planning, Quality and Strategic Development, welcomed the attendees and introduced Dr Nuria Casals, professor at UIC Barcelona and director of the From Cell Metabolism to Metabolic Diseases research group, who presented Dr Rodríguez's merits. Among these, she particularly highlighted her human qualities, her dedication to teaching, her leadership skills, and the scientific rigour reflected in her impeccable academic and research career. The new professor then delivered her inaugural lecture entitled “Redefining obesity and diabetes: from the brain to the nanomedicine of the future”.
In her presentation, Dr Rodríguez addressed obesity and diabetes as global problems whose root cause lies in the brain, particularly in the hypothalamus. The new professor described the brain mechanisms that hinder traditional diet and exercise-based treatments for reducing and preventing obesity, emphasising the importance of designing and developing personalised therapies targeting the hypothalamus, in which nanomedicine plays a fundamental role. Dr Rodríguez also reviewed her scientific career and outlined the main research lines she leads with her team, including the transition from molecular research to therapeutic application.
Dr Rosalía Rodríguez holds a degree in Pharmacy and a PhD in Pharmacology from the University of Seville. She began her scientific career at the University of Seville and the CSIC, where she focused her doctoral research on the vasodilatory effects of triterpene compounds in olive oil on hypertension and metabolic syndrome. Her postdoctoral work took place at prestigious international institutions such as Aarhus University (Denmark) and the University of Oxford (United Kingdom). She later joined the University of Seville as a lecturer in Pharmacology, where she established her own research line on the molecular mechanisms involved in metabolic syndrome, obesity and dietary response.
Currently, Dr Rodríguez’s research focuses on hypothalamic regulation of obesity, with particular attention to microglia and neurons, incorporating a gender perspective, as well as on the development of brain-targeted nanomedicines for obesity administered intranasally. As a result of this research trajectory, the new professor has published 78 indexed articles, three patents, has supervised 12 doctoral theses, and led 32 national and international research projects, reinforcing her conceptual and translational contribution to the field of metabolic neurobiology.
Since 2014, Dr Rodríguez has been a member of the Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences, where she manages the Department of Biomedical Sciences and leads the NeuroNanoMet group.
