Abstract

Professor Sheng joined Genentech in September 2008. Prior to that, he spent 14 years in academia focused on molecular and cellular neuroscience – first at Massachusetts General Hospital/Harvard Medical School and then at Massachusetts Institute of Technology, where he was the Menicon Professor of Neuroscience and an Investigator of the Howard Hughes Medical Institute. Before he got into research, he completed a residency in general medicine in London.

Professor Sheng’s research is broadly divided into three areas: (i) the molecular mechanisms of synapse weakening and loss (which are characteristic of neurodegenerative disorders such as Alzheimer’s); (ii) the molecular regulation of synapses on inhibitory interneurons (dysfunction of which is implicated in schizophrenia and autism); (iii) uncovering fresh insights into the pathogenesis of Alzheimer’s disease, Parkinson’s disease and frontotemporal dementia, starting from identification of novel human gene mutations that increase the risk of these disorders. These directions of research should yield new mechanisms and pathways that are of wide scientific interest and that might be a strategy for neurodegenerative and neurodevelopmental diseases.

Genentech is a company that aims to translate an increasing knowledge of the basic causes of disease into potential treatments for serious brain disorders.

Speaker’s corporate website: http://www.gene.com/scientists/our-scientists/morgan-sheng

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