Dr. Przedborski's academic interests focus on the molecular and cellular biology of neurodegenerative disorders such as Parkinson's disease (PD) and Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS). His ongoing research aims at understanding the contributions of cell-autonomous and non cell-autonomous mechanisms to neurodegeneration using both toxic and genetic experimental models of PD and ALS. In keeping with this goal, how alterations in mitochondrial biology, especially of mitochondrial dynamics and mitophagy, provoke degeneration of specific subpopulations of neurons is one of the main areas of research in the Przedborski laboratory. To what extent and by which mechanisms do non-neuronal cells, like microglia and astrocytes, participate in the demise of neurons in neurodegenerative disorders, such as PD and ALS, represent a second main line of research in this laboratory.

These research efforts are supported by federal grants from both NIH and the DoD as well as by several private agencies such as the Parkinson's Disease Foundation and the Thomas Hartman Foundation. Dr. Przedborski is a Senior Editor for the Journal of Neuroscience and an Associate Editor of Movement Disorders. He also serves as an ad hoc Reviewer for the National Institutes of Health, the Veterans Adminsration, the Department of Defense, the Canadian Medical Research Council, and various medical journals including Science, Nature, Nature Neuroscience, Neuron, the New England Journal of Medicine, and the Proceedings of the National Academy of Science USA.

Email: sp30@cumc.columbia.edu