Rate My Professor Krystof Bankiewicz

Krystof Bankiewicz, MD, PhD, DSc, is a tenured Professor in the Department of Neurological Surgery at The Ohio State University College of Medicine. He serves as Vice Chair of Research, Director of the Center for Brain Health and Performance, Chief Scientific Officer of the Gene Therapy Institute, and holds the Gilbert and Kathryn Mitchell Endowed Chair at The Ohio State University Wexner Medical Center. Bankiewicz joined The Ohio State University in 2019, following his tenure as Professor Emeritus and Vice Chair for Research in Neurological Surgery at the University of California, San Francisco. Previously, he was Chief of the Molecular Therapeutics Section at the National Institutes of Health and directed Interventional Neuro Centers at Brodno Hospital in Warsaw, Poland, and at UCSF. He is a co-founder of Voyager Therapeutics Inc., Brain Neurotherapy Bio Inc., and MedGenesis Therapeutix Inc.

Bankiewicz earned his MD from Jagiellonian University in Krakow, Poland, PhD and DSc from the Institute of Neurology and Psychiatry in Warsaw, Poland, completed a residency in Neuro-orthopedics at the Postgraduate Medical Center in Warsaw, an internship in General Surgery at the Medical Academy of Warsaw, and a fellowship in Surgical Neurology at the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke, NIH. His research focuses on translational approaches to drug, gene, and cell replacement therapies for neurological disorders, including Parkinson's disease, AADC deficiency, Alzheimer's disease, multiple system atrophy, neurotrauma, lysosomal storage disorders, and substance use disorders such as alcohol and opioid addiction. He leads ongoing gene therapy clinical trials for Parkinson's disease and pediatric neurotransmitter deficiencies, utilizing convection-enhanced delivery of AAV vectors. Bankiewicz has authored over 230 peer-reviewed articles, with highly cited publications including "Dopamine neurons derived from embryonic stem cells function in an animal model of Parkinson's disease" (2002), "Safety and tolerability of putaminal AADC gene therapy for Parkinson disease" (2009), and "Gene therapy for neurological disorders: progress and prospects" (2018). He holds numerous patents for surgical devices and convection-enhanced delivery systems. Notable awards include election as a Fellow of the National Academy of Inventors (2023), Member of the Polish Academy of Sciences (2017), Drug Development Prize from the Academy of Molecular Imaging (2002), and DeWitt Stetten, Jr. Lecture at NIH (1988). He serves on editorial boards for the Journal of Polish Neurology and Neurosurgery and Journal of Neural Transplantation and Plasticity.