Parkinson's Institute and Clinical Center

Carrolee Barlow, MD, PhD—renowned expert in neuroscience and neurodegeneration—joined the Parkinson’s Institute and Clinical Center as Chief Executive Officer (CEO) in February 2014. Dr. Barlow is the second CEO in the Institute’s 25 year history. She takes the reins from Dr. J. William Langston, who founded the organization in 1988.

Dr. Barlow’s previous work has spanned clinical care, laboratory and clinical research, academia, and industry. She is the former Chief Scientific Officer and Chief Medical Officer of BrainCells, Inc. in San Diego, California, a biotechnology company focused on the discovery and development of small molecules that stimulate adult hippocampal neurogenesis for the treatment of neurological and psychiatric disease using human neural stem cell technology. Prior to BrainCells, she served as the Director of Molecular Neuroscience and Therapeutic Area Head for Stroke and Neurodegeneration at Merck Research Laboratories where she was responsible for neuroscience biology, global exploratory, licensing, and full-phase efforts. Dr. Barlow has held a faculty position in the Laboratory of Genetics at the Salk Institute for Biological Studies in La Jolla, California. She also serves as an advisory board member for several biotechnology companies and disease foundations advancing therapies for rare diseases and disorders of the central nervous system (CNS).

Dr. Barlow received her MD from the University of Utah, did her residency in Internal Medicine at The New York Hospital, Cornell Medical Center, and went on to obtain a PhD in molecular and developmental biology at the Karolinska Medical Nobel Institute in Stockholm, Sweden. Shortly thereafter, she joined the National Institutes of Health and completed medical sub-specialty training in the field of endocrinology and a postdoctoral fellowship in neurogenetics at the National Human Genome Research Institute.

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