Dr Kellie Dean is a College Lecturer and Principal Investigator in the School of Biochemistry and Cell Biology at University College Cork (UCC). Originally from western Pennsylvania, Kellie graduated with a BSc in Chemistry, minor in Biology, from Indiana University of Pennsylvania, USA. After completing her PhD in Biochemistry and Biophysics at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in 1999, she then worked as a post-doctoral researcher first at the Center for Molecular Biology (ZMBH), University of Heidelberg, Germany, and later with the Howard Hughes Medical Institute at Duke University in Durham, North Carolina.

Moving to Ireland in 2005, she began lecturing part-time at UCC, teaching biochemistry to Medicine, Dentistry and Pharmacy students. In 2008, she was appointed Training Coordinator of the Health Research Board-funded, PhD Scholars Programme in Cancer Biology, directed by Prof Rosemary O’Connor. Since 2015 she has been a full-time College Lecturer, leading a research group that is focused on understanding the roles of non-coding RNAs, RNA-binding proteins, RNA-protein complexes in cancer and other human diseases. Notably her group has identified several long, non-coding RNAs (lncRNAs) that are differentially expressed in ductal carcinoma in situ (DCIS) cell lines and a small patient cohort. Ongoing work is focused on the functional characterisation of DCIS-associated lncRNAs, as well as their development as potential diagnostic and/or prognostic tools. Her other research interests include translational regulation and liquid-liquid phase separation of RNA-protein assemblies. Additionally, she is a named supervisor on the Science Foundation of Ireland (SFI) Centre for Research Training in Genomics Data Science.

At UCC, Dr Dean is director of the MSc in Molecular Cell Biology with Bioinnovation and the MRes in Biochemistry and Cell Biology. She is also co-coordinator of UCC Cell EXPLORERS scientific outreach team, funded by the SFI. In collaboration with the University of California – Davis, Dr Dean directs and teaches a summer abroad programme in the biological sciences. Nationally and internationally, she is a member of the Irish and European Associations for Cancer Research, the Biochemical Society and the RNA Society. She was elected to the IACR Junior Council in 2019.