Rate My Professor Chris Ford

Chris Ford, PhD, is a Professor in the Department of Pharmacology at the University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus. He received his B.S. in Biological Sciences from the University of Alberta in 1998 and his Ph.D. in Neuroscience from the same institution in 2003. Ford completed his postdoctoral training at the Vollum Institute, Oregon Health & Science University, from 2004 to 2010. His academic career began as an Assistant Professor in the Department of Physiology & Biophysics at Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine in 2011, where he was promoted to Associate Professor with tenure in 2017. That year, he joined the University of Colorado School of Medicine as Associate Professor in Pharmacology and advanced to full Professor in 2020.

Ford's research investigates how neuromodulators are encoded in the mesolimbic and nigrostriatal dopamine systems and how circuit dysfunctions contribute to disorders such as addiction and Parkinson's disease. His laboratory employs cutting-edge techniques to examine synaptic transmission, plasticity, and co-release of neurotransmitters like dopamine and GABA. Ford has earned numerous honors, including the University of Alberta Mary Louise Imrie Graduate Student Award (1999), NIH K99/R00 Pathway to Independence Award (2009), NARSAD Young Investigator Award from the Brain & Behavior Research Foundation (2011-2012), University of Colorado Department of Pharmacology Excellence in Teaching Award (2021), University of Colorado Anschutz Research Collaboration Team Award (2022), and Parkinson's Foundation Impact Awards (2022-2025). His influential publications include "Discrete spatiotemporal encoding of striatal dopamine transmission" in Science (2025, with Yee AG et al.), "Heterogenous pericoerulear neurons tune arousal and exploratory behaviors" in Nature (2025, with Luskin AT et al.), "Reduced striatal M4-cholinergic signaling following dopamine loss contributes to parkinsonian and L-DOPA-induced dyskinetic behaviors" in Science Advances (2024), "Adaptor protein-3 produces synaptic vesicles that release phasic dopamine" in PNAS (2023, with Jain S et al.), and "Loss of nigral excitation of cholinergic interneurons contributes to parkinsonian motor impairments" in Neuron (2021, with Cai Y et al.). Ford's work has advanced understandings of basal ganglia circuits, dopamine dynamics, and therapeutic targets for neurological disorders.