Joao P. De Aquino, MD, assistant professor of psychiatry, delivered the Presidential Keynote at the 2026 Annual Meeting of the College on Problems of Drug Dependence (CPDD) on June 14 in Portland, Ore.
De Aquino was invited to open a new special track, "The Real World of Addiction," with a keynote titled "Designing Translational Addiction Science Under Real-World Boundary Conditions."
The address introduced a framework for improving how addiction treatments move from the laboratory to the clinic. Drawing on principles from physics, De Aquino argued that the conditions surrounding experimental designs — from who is studied to what healthcare context delivers the treatment — shape whether scientific discoveries ultimately reach patients.
The keynote was followed by an invited panel of five scientists representing preclinical science, clinical research, implementation, and federal funding perspectives.
De Aquino also organized a symposium at the meeting, which brought together researchers from Indiana University, UCLA, and Columbia University to examine whether cannabinoid-based strategies can meaningfully reduce opioid exposure and at what cost in terms of safety and misuse risk.
CPDD is the leading international organization for research on substance use and addiction. Its annual meeting convenes scientists, clinicians, and policymakers from across the translational spectrum. The Presidential Keynote is among the society's most prominent invited addresses.
De Aquino directs the Pain and Addiction Interaction Neuroscience (PAIN) Lab at Yale, where his research focuses on the intersection of chronic pain and substance use disorders and on the development of novel, non-opioid therapeutics.