Who We Are

Scott C. Baraban, PhD

Scott C. Baraban, PhD is Professor of Neurological Surgery and William K. Bowes Jr. Endowed Chair in Neuroscience Research at UCSF where he directs an epilepsy research laboratory in the Department of Neurological Surgery. His pioneering research focuses on translational questions and includes work on models of pediatric epilepsy in zebrafish and interneuron-based cell therapies for epilepsy. The first zebrafish models for epilepsy were developed in his laboratory over 10 years ago, and his group published the first high-throughput drug screens using a zebrafish model for Dravet syndrome. He has authored more than 100 publications, including papers in the Journal of Neuroscience, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences USA, Neuron, Nature Communications, Science and Nature Neuroscience. He has received several research honors, including the Basil O’ Connor Scholar Research award, a Klingenstein Foundation Fellowship in Neuroscience and an NIH EUREKA award. He was recently awarded a Javits Neuroscience Investigator Award from the NIH and the Basic Science Research award from the American Epilepsy Society.

Dr. Baraban received his Bachelor’s degree from Johns Hopkins University and Ph.D. from the University of Virginia. He completed postdoctoral training at the University of Washington. He currently serves on the Scientific Advisory Board of the Dravet Syndrome Foundation and Gruppo Famiglie Dravet Associazione of Italy. He is a Co-Founder of EpyGenix Therapeutics.

Jack Parent, MD

Jack Parent, MD. is the William J. Herdman Professor of Neurology and co-Director of the Epilepsy Division in the Department of Neurology at the University of Michigan, where he established the Neurodevelopment and Regeneration Laboratory in 2000. His innovative research focuses on the fields of epilepsy, stem cell biology, and regeneration after stroke and other brain injuries. The first “disease-in-a-dish” human induced pluripotent stem cell lines for Dravet syndrome were established in his laboratory. He has received several awards, including a Paul Beeson Physician Faculty Scholars in Aging Award, a Dreifuss-Penry Epilepsy Award from the American Academy of Neurology, a Grass Foundation Award in Neuroscience from the American Neurological Association, and was inducted into the University of Michigan Medical School League of Research Excellence as a Taubman Scholar. Dr. Parent serves as Secretary of the American Neurological Association, recently served on the Board of the American Epilepsy Society, chairs the Scientific Advisory Board of the Dravet Syndrome Foundation, and has been a standing member on NIH study sections for the past 10 years. He also serves on a number of editorial boards and is the Chief Editor for Basic Science of Epilepsy Currents and the Epilepsy Section Editor of Experimental Neurology.

Dr. Parent received an A.B. with distinction in Human Biology from Stanford University and his M.D. from Yale University School of Medicine. He completed medical internship, neurology residency, clinical epilepsy fellowship, and post-doctoral training in neuroscience research at the University of California, San Francisco.

Kelly Knupp, MD

Kelly Knupp, MD is an Associate Professor of Pediatrics and Neurology at the University of Colorado.

She received her medical degree from the University of New Mexico – School of Medicine, completed her residency in Pediatrics at Children’s Hospital of New York followed by Pediatric Neurology Residency at Columbia University at Children’s Hospital of New York. After her residency, she trained as a Clinical Fellow in Pediatric Epilepsy at the Columbia Comprehensive Epilepsy Center at New York Presbyterian Hospital.

Dr. Knupp now practices at Children’s Hospital Colorado in Aurora, CO. and is the Associate Research Director of Neuroscience Institute and Director of the Dravet Program.
Her interests are epileptic encephalopathies including Dravet Syndrome and infantile spasms. She was a founding member of the Pediatric Epilepsy Research Consortium and continues on the steering committee.

This group focuses on developing collaborative research across the country for children with epileptic encephalopathies. She also serves on the medical advisory boards of the Epilepsy Foundation of Colorado, Round up River Ranch and the Dravet Syndrome Foundation.

Joseph Sullivan, MD

Joseph Sullivan, MD is an Associate Professor of Neurology and Pediatrics at the University of California San Francisco and Director of the UCSF Pediatric Epilepsy Center at Benioff Children’s Hospital. As a pediatric epileptologist, he cares for all children with various forms of epilepsy but has specific clinical and research interests in Dravet Syndrome, PCDH19 related epilepsy and the evaluation of children for epilepsy surgery. Dr. Sullivan is a member of the American Epilepsy Society and serves on boards including Chair of the PCDH19 Alliance Scientific Advisory Board, Chair of the Epilepsy Foundation of Northern California, and is a member of the Medical Advisory Board for the Dravet Syndrome Foundation and the Pediatric Epilepsy Research Consortium Steering Committee. He is a graduate of Union College and Albany Medical College.

He completed a pediatric residency at the Children’s Memorial Hospital of Northwestern University in Chicago where he spent an additional year as pediatric chief resident. He then completed his Neurology, Child Neurology and Epilepsy training at the Hospital of University of Pennsylvania and The Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia before coming to UCSF in 2007.