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Michael J. Zigmond, PhD - Scientific Advisory Board
Professor
Department of Neurology and Psychiatry
University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine
Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania

Michael J. Zigmond received his undergraduate degree in chemical engineering in 1963 from Carnegie Institute of Technology (now Carnegie Mellon University). He received a PhD from the University of Chicago in 1968. After postdoctoral training at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, he joined the faculty of the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine in 1970 and now serves there as a professor of neurology and psychiatry.

Zigmond's research interests focus on the survival, death, and adaptation of neurons, particularly those that utilize dopamine and other catecholamines as neurotransmitters. In addition to his work at the National Parkinson Foundation Center of Excellence at Pittsburgh, he is associate director for basic research of the Pittsburgh Institute for Neurodegenerative Disease and directs a research program in cell death and parkinsonism supported by the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke (NINDS). Zigmond was secretary for the 25,000-member Society for Neuroscience from 1994 to 1995 and is currently the editor in chief of Progress in Neurobiology.