Kinga Szigeti, MD PhD

Kinga Szigeti MD, PhD, is the founding director of the Alzheimer’s Disease and Memory Disorders Center and the Translational Genomics Research Laboratory in the Jacobs School of Medicine and Biomedical Sciences. The Center was recently designated a Center of Excellence for Alzheimer’s disease by the New York State Department of Health.

The clinical mission of Szigeti’s team is to provide compassionate, state-of-the-art care for patients and families affected by Alzheimer’s disease and other cognitive disorders. Their research mission is to employ genetic tools to identify novel risk factors and potential pathways that can be targeted with medications to prevent or modify the course of disease.

Szigeti’s group has made a number of discoveries, including the identification an olfactory receptor CNV association with age at onset of Alzheimer’s disease. They are now applying a novel method to study the olfactory subgenome in relation to smell sensation and cognition and are participating in a related multicenter study funded by the National Institute of Aging. The group also has identified a human-specific fusion gene, CHRFAM7A, as a risk factor for Alzheimer’s disease. Their lab is modeling Alzheimer’s disease in a dish to understand the mechanism by which this fusion gene confers disease susceptibility.

After serving her neurology residency at UB from 1999 to 2002, Szigeti completed a genetics fellowship at Baylor College of Medicine. She earned her medical degree at the University of Pecs, Hungary, and her PhD in clinical neuroscience at the University of Szeged, Hungary, both summa cum laude.