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It is with great sadness that we report the passing, on April 27th, 2017, of Dr. Adil Nazarali, a widely respected colleague and a long-time member of the editorial board of Cellular and Molecular Neurobiology. Adil was born in Uganda, but did his equivalent of high school training in the United Kingdom (UK). He completed degrees in Pharmacy and Biopharmacy at Portsmouth School of Pharmacy and at Chelsea College, respectively, in the UK before coming to the University of Alberta (UofA), where he completed a Ph.D. program in Pharmaceutical Sciences in the Neurochemical Research Unit under the cosupervision of Drs. Glen Baker and Ron Coutts. After that, he did a postdoctoral fellowship in the Division of Neurosurgery at the UofA with Dr. Don Boisvert and a visiting fellowship in the Department of Pathology at the University of Nottingham with Dr. Gavin Reynolds before going to the National Institutes of Health (NIH) in Bethesda, Maryland. At NIH, he spent 2 years as a guest researcher with Dr. Juan Saavedra and 4.5 years as a visiting research associate with Nobel Laureate Dr. Marshall Nirenberg. In 1993, Adil returned to Canada, coming to the University of Saskatchewan (UofS). There he held academic appointments first in the Department of Anatomy and then the College of Pharmacy and Nutrition, where he spent the last 22 years, receiving promotion to full Professor in 2006.

While at the UofS, he set up a strong research program in molecular biology and was very successful at training many undergraduate and graduate students and postdoctoral fellows and at obtaining research grants. In 2015, Adil won the Provost’s College Award for Outstanding Teaching. Teaching was very important to Adil and he was always searching for new ways to deliver information that would create excitement and interest among his students. This included using new technology in the classroom to ensure his students were understanding the material presented to them. He genuinely cared about his students and encouraged them to pursue their dreams, especially when they were interested in research. Research was his passion; he spent endless hours in the lab and stood alongside his graduate students as they evaluated data and techniques to answer important questions. Accuracy and quality of work were paramount to him and he expected that of his students. During his career, he published 65 peer-reviewed papers, 10 book chapters, and numerous abstracts of presentations at conferences. Adil was recently elected a Fellow of the Royal Pharmaceutical Society of Great Britain for his lifetime contributions to Pharmacy and since 2015 was leader of the multidisciplinary Neuroscience Research Cluster at the UofS.

For the past 5 years, he coordinated a Leadership and Community Placement Program in Pharmacy at Mbarara University in Uganda in which UofS students participate. His international work was near and dear to his heart; as Uganda is where he was born, he wanted to give back to the Ugandan people where he saw much hope for the country’s future.

Adil, a highly skilled and meticulous neuroscientist, was a caring, generous, and optimistic person. His life motto was “Live and Let Live.” He was a devoted family man and leaves behind Kathy, his beloved wife of 34 years, and his two cherished children, Jenna and Adam. He is sorely missed by the many colleagues and friends with whom he interacted over many years. A Celebration of Life was held for Adil at the UofS on May 27th and was attended by a large number of friends and family members.