Emmanuel Onaivi

Dr. Emmanuel S. Onaivi is Professor in the department of Biology at William Paterson University (WPU) in New Jersey, a Fulbright scholar and a Guest Scientist at the National Institute on Drug Abuse a part of NIH in Baltimore, MD. His research interests include the molecular biology of drug abuse and teaches Neural Basis of Behavior, Pharmacology, Bioseminar, and Anatomy and Physiology. Professor Onaivi teaches cannabis as medicine in the Pharmacology course. He has authored and co-authored many papers and edited three books on cannabis including the Biology of Marijuana; Endocannabinoids: The brain and body’s marijuana and beyond; and Marijuana and cannabinoid research methods and protocols. Professor Onaivi’s pioneering research on cannabis, its constituent cannabinoids and the natural cannabis compounds produced by the human body called endocannabinoids led to:
•Cloning of CB1 cannabinoid receptors in mice
•The discovery and identification of functional neuronal CB2 cannabinoid receptors (CB2Rs)
•Ethnic and gender differences in cannabinoid receptors
•Creation and generation of cell type specific CB2R conditional knockout mice for which William Paterson University, Dr. Onaivi and his collaborator Dr. Liu have obtained a global patent https://patents.google.com/patent/WO2016137966A1/en
•Demonstration of the interaction between cannabinoid receptors and vanilloid receptors as a basis of why some like it hot and spicy and others do not. This research was competitively selected, and presented on Capitol Hill in Washington DC to show case Undergraduate student research.

Professor Onaivi was the recipient of William Paterson University Award for Excellence in Scholarship and creative expression in 2007, 2015 and 2021. The National Institute of Health funded his research titled Behavioral effects of CB2 receptors. He has supervised Doctoral, Pre- and Postdoctoral fellows, Masters and Undergraduate student research. He is a member of the society for Neuroscience, and the editor for the International Drug abuse Research Society Newsletter and an associate editor for Journal of Drug and Alcohol Research.

Professional Interests

Behavioral Neuroscience and molecular basis of drug addiction.  Endocannabinoid system and cannabis research.