Faculty and Staff

Sreeganga S. Chandra received her Ph.D. in Chemistry from Purdue University. In her postdoctoral research, she pursued her interest in neuronal cell biology and neurodegeneration in the lab of Thomas C. Südhof at UT Southwestern Medical Center at Dallas. She is currently an Associate Professor in the Departments of Neurology and Neuroscience.

Emilia Favuzzi is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Neuroscience and Wu Tsai Institute at Yale University. She grew up in Italy and received a B.S. in Biology and a M.S. in Neurobiology from Sapienza University of Rome. She did her doctoral training at the Institute of Neuroscience in Alicante (Spain) and the Centre for Developmental Neurobiology at King’s College London. Her graduate research focused on the cellular and molecular mechanisms of inhibitory circuit development and plasticity in the cerebral cortex. In her postdoctoral work at Harvard Medical School and the Broad Institute, she focused on microglia-inhibitory synapse interactions during development and discovered that specialized microglia differentially engage with specific synapse types. Her past work opened a new avenue in understanding neuroimmune crosstalk by showing that neuroimmune interactions within the brain may be as specific as those between neurons. This novel conceptual framework is the foundation of the Favuzzi lab focused on the immune and glial mechanisms underlying brain wiring and function, with an emphasis on (1) interactions among neuronal and non-neuronal cells and (2) brain-body communication. Over the years, Emilia was awarded numerous prizes such as the Beddington Medal from the British Society for Developmental Biology, the Krieg Cortical Kudos Scholar Award from the Cajal Club, the Next Generation Leader by the Allen Institute, and the Gruber International Research Award.

Dr. Ferguson earned BSc (Biochemistry-Nutrition) and MSc (Physiology) degrees from the University of Ottawa followed by a PhD in Neuroscience from Vanderbilt University in 2004. From 2004-2010, he was a postdoctoral fellow with Pietro De Camilli in the Department of Cell Biology at Yale. As a postdoc, he studied the membrane trafficking mechanisms that allow neurons to make and recycle the synaptic vesicles that store and release neurotransmitters that support communication between neurons. Although centered on the topic of neuronal cell biology, this research resulted in many additional collaborative studies that focused on how similar membrane trafficking mechanisms are adapted to the needs of other cell types. In 2010, Dr. Ferguson founded his own lab as an assistant professor in the Department of Cell Biology at Yale where he currently holds the rank of Associate Professor (tenured). His research focuses on the intersection between lysosome cell biology and neurodegenerative diseases. The long-term goal of research in the Ferguson lab is to advance understanding of cell biological mechanisms that allow specialized cell types such as neurons, microglia and macrophages to meet the challenges imposed by their unique physiological demands in order to help diagnose, treat and prevent diseases arising from lysosome dysfunction. Motivated by clues coming from human genetics and disease pathology, major ongoing projects in the lab address the role of lysosomes in Alzheimer’s disease, amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), frontotemporal dementia (FTD) and Parkinson’s disease.

Dr. Fredericks’ research focuses on preclinical Alzheimer’s disease and on less common Alzheimer’s variants, using advanced imaging tools to better understand how Alzheimer’s disease progresses through functional networks in the brain. She is a member of Yale’s Clinical Neuroscience Imaging Center (CNIC), a multidisciplinary group applying innovative imaging methods to the study of brain disease. Clinically, Dr. Fredericks sees patients with a variety of cognitive and behavioral concerns. She specializes in the diagnosis and treatment of neurodegenerative disorders.

Dr. Grutzendler obtained his MD from Universidad Javeriana in Bogota, Colombia, where he was born and raised. He completed a medical internship in Internal Medicine and a residency in Neurology at Washington University/Barnes-Jewish Hospital in St. Louis. Following that, he pursued a combined clinical and research fellowship in the Alzheimer Disease Research Center and the Department of Neurobiology at Washington University, with additional neurobiology research training at the Skirball Institute of New York University. Dr. Grutzendler's laboratory is dedicated to understanding the cellular and molecular mechanisms of normal brain function and neuropathology. They have a particular focus on elucidating mechanisms underlying neurodegeneration, such as those found in Alzheimer's disease. Additionally, they aim to advance the understanding of cell-cell interactions through the utilization of intravital optical imaging techniques, enabling them to study the brain in real-time and observe dynamic processes at the cellular and molecular levels. Moreover, their laboratory is interested in developing therapeutics for brain disorders. Leveraging their expertise in brain imaging, they work with chemists to develop novel small molecules to target specific brain cell types for drug delivery and as imaging probes. In addition to the research endeavors, Dr. Grutzendler is actively involved in clinical activities focused on dementia and Alzheimer's patients. He works closely with individuals affected by these neurodegenerative disorders, providing comprehensive care and support.

Janghoo Lim received his undergraduate and master’s degrees in South Korea. He then completed his Ph.D. and postdoctoral trainings at Baylor College of Medicine, Houston, Texas. He joined Yale in 2010 and is currently an Associate Professor in the Departments of Genetics and of Neuroscience.

Noah W. Palm is a Professor of Immunobiology at the Yale University School of Medicine. His laboratory focuses on illuminating the myriad interactions between the immune system and the gut microbiota in health and disease. Dr. Palm performed his doctoral work with Ruslan Medzhitov and his postdoctoral work with Richard Flavell, both at Yale University.

Dr. Pitt obtained his MD at Philipps University in Germany. He subsequently completed a postdoctoral fellowship in the laboratory of Dr. Cedric S. Raine at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine (AECOM) in the Bronx, followed by a neurology residency at AECOM, and a combined clinical and research fellowship in Neuroimmunology at Washington University/Barnes-Jewish Hospital in St. Louis. His clinical and research interest focuses on multiple sclerosis (MS) and MS-related neurodegeneration.

Srikant Rangaraju, MD, MS is an Associate Professor of Neurology, a vascular neurologist and a physician-scientist. After establishing his research program at Emory University, Atlanta, he moved to Yale in 2023. Dr. Rangaraju’s research has focused on exploring immune-mediated mechanisms of neurodegeneration and post-ischemic injury in the brain, leveraging pre-clinical mouse models as well as multi-omics modalities to assess molecular changes occurring in diverse classes of neurons and glial cells. He is also actively involved in clinical research in stroke, via participation in clinical trials, and clinical research studies related to post-stroke prognosis, plasma-based protein biomarkers and risk-stratification in cryptogenic stroke. Dr. Rangaraju provides clinical care for patients with stroke, both in the in-patient and outpatient settings. Since 2016, the Rangaraju Lab has been funded by the NIH. The group has identified promising therapeutic targets to modulate microglia-mediated mechanisms in neurodegeneration and stroke. On example is the potassium channel, Kv1.3, that is over-expressed in a sub-set of pro-inflammatory microglia and macrophages in the brain in Alzheimer’s disease, as well as in the sub-acute phase following ischemic stroke. Using pharmacological and genetic approaches to manipulate Kv1.3, they have identified Kv1.3 channels as key regulators of neuroinflammatory responses in these diseases. The group has also developed novel in vivo tools to assess protein-level (proteomic) mechanisms of disease that are unique to different brain cell types, in pre-clinical mouse models. To this end, they have developed an approach called cell type-specific in vivo biotinylation of proteins (CIBOP) to identify early molecular changes occurring in neurons and glial cells, which can be therapeutic targets for disease-modification.