Dr. John Mazziotta has been named chair of the Department of Neurology at the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA, and the Francis Stark Chair of Neurology. Mazziotta already holds the positions of UCLA professor of neurology, radiological sciences, and medical and molecular pharmacology; Pierson-Lovelace Investigator; and director of the UCLA Brain Mapping Center.
As chair of the department, Mazziotta is responsible for administering the research, teaching and clinical activities of 222 academic and 234 staff personnel, and more than a dozen research, clinical and teaching programs. These programs cover brain mapping and neuroimaging, movement disorders, Alzheimer's disease, multiple sclerosis, neurogenetics, nerve and muscle disorders, epilepsy, neuro-oncology, neurotology, neuropsychology, headaches and migraines, neurorehabilitation, and neurovascular disorders.
Department faculty provide services at UCLA Medical Center in Westwood; the West L.A. and Sepulveda VA hospitals; and Olive View, Harbor-UCLA and Santa Monica-UCLA medical centers. In fiscal year 2001--02, the department operated on an annual budget of $27 million, including $16 million in extramural research funds. It has ranked among the nation's top 10 neurology department recipients of NIH awards for the last three years and is richly endowed, with philanthropic donations topping $21 million.
Among his many ongoing research projects, Mazziotta is principal investigator of the International Consortium for Brain Mapping (ICBM). The primary goal of the ICBM project is the continuing development of the first comprehensive atlas of the structure and function of the normal adult human brain. The decade-long project is expected to reach fruition in 2003.
After receiving his B.A. and M.A. degrees in biochemistry from Columbia University in 1972, Mazziotta obtained an M.D. and Ph.D. in neuroanatomy and computer science from Georgetown University in 1977. Following an internship at Georgetown, he completed neurology and nuclear medicine training at UCLA and joined the faculty in 1983.
As a practicing clinical neurologist, associate director of the UCLA Neuropsychiatric Institute and director of the UCLA Brain Mapping Center, Mazziotta has published more than 200 research papers and seven texts.
He has received numerous awards and honors recognizing his work, including the Oldendorf Award of the American Society of Neuroimaging, the S. Weir Mitchell Award and the Wartenberg Prize of the American Academy of Neurology, the Von Hevesy Prize from the International Society of Nuclear Medicine, and the UCLA Medical Alumni Award.
RSS