Huda Y. Zoghbi, M.D.
Zoghbi is the Ralph D. Feigin Professor of Pediatrics, Neurology, Neuroscience, and Molecular and Human Genetics at Baylor College of Medicine, an Investigator with the Howard Hughes Medical Institute, and the founding Director of the Jan and Dan Duncan Neurological Research Institute at Texas Children鈥檚 Hospital.
Zoghbi鈥檚 interests range from neurodevelopment to neurodegeneration.聽Her discovery (with Harry Orr) that Spinocerebellar Ataxia type 1 is caused by expansion of a polyglutamine tract and her subsequent studies have had profound ramifications since many late-onset neurological disorders involve accumulations of disease-driving proteins.聽Zoghbi鈥檚 work in neurodevelopment led to the discovery of the gene聽Math1/Atoh1聽and showing that it governs the development of several components of the proprioceptive, balance, hearing, vestibular, and breathing pathways. Zoghbi鈥檚 group also discovered that mutations in聽MECP2聽cause the postnatal neurological disorder Rett syndrome and revealed that changes in the levels of MeCP2 in either direction underlie various neuropsychiatric features.
She has been elected to the National Academy of Medicine, the National Academy of Sciences, and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. Among Zoghbi鈥檚 recent honors are the Shaw Prize in Life Science and Medicine, the Breakthrough Prize in Life Sciences, and Canada Gairdner International Prize.