Gabor G Kovacs, MD, PhD

Dr. Kovacs is Professor in the Department of Laboratory Medicine and Pathobiology at the University of Toronto, a Consultant Neuropathologist at the Laboratory Medicine Program (LMP) at the University Health Network (UHN) and a Principal Investigator at the Tanz Centre for Research in Neurodegenerative Disease. He is also a Senior Scientist at the Krembil Brain Institute, a Faculty member of the Edmond J. Safra Program in Parkinson's Disease and the Co-Director of the Rossy Program for Progressive Supranuclear Palsy Research (UHN).

Dr. Kovacs completed his medical training at the Semmelweis University (Budapest, Hungary) where he specialized in Neurology (1998) and Neuropathology (2003) and obtained a PhD in Neuroscience (2002). From 2004 to 2007, Dr. Kovacs was the Head of the Department of Neuropathology at the National Institute of Psychiatry and Neurology in Budapest, Hungary. From 2007 to 2019, he was an Associate Professor at the Institute of Neurology at the Medical University of Vienna, Austria. He was the leader of the Hungarian (2004-2019) and Austrian (2011-2019) Reference Center for Human Prion Diseases. Dr. Kovacs has also trained at Indiana University (2007) and University of Pennsylvania (2016 and 2017) as a visiting professor/scholar.

His major research interest is the neuropathology of neurodegenerative diseases. He has published more than 260 peer-reviewed papers, earning him an H-index of 45, and edited two books on Neuropathology. Dr. Kovacs‘s aim is to use his expertise in the neuropathology of neurodegenerative diseases to enhance the excellent Neuropathology team at LMP, to probe the molecular mechanisms underlying neurodegenerative proteinopathies using state-of the-art methodologies and to facilitate collaborative research on neurodegenerative disorders at the Krembil Brain Institute and Tanz Centre for Research in Neurodegenerative Disease.

Understanding selective vulnerability of the human brain
 
Our research program is supported by the Edmond J. Safra Program in Parkinson’s Disease and the Rossy Program for Progressive Supranuclear Palsy Research. We examine the human neuropathology of diseases involving progressive neurodegeneration with a clinical manifestation of movement disorders and cognitive decline. Our laboratory collaborates with basic researchers, neuroscientists, and clinicians to learn about these conditions from multiple perspectives. 
 
We are interested in discovering the pathologic mechanisms underlying nerve cell death and in particular determining the reasons for the selective vulnerability of particular nerve cell groups in certain neurodegenerative diseases. We study disease-associated proteins such as alpha-synuclein in alpha-synucleinopathies such as Parkinson's disease and multiple system atrophy, and tau in tauopathies such as progressive supranuclear palsy, corticobasal degeneration, Pick's disease and globular glial tauopathies. We also examine various further genetic, sporadic and acquired neurodegenertative conditions. Our work involves extensive use of neuropathologically, clinically and genetically characterized human brain tissues provided for research purposes housed at our site, as well as samples collected prospectively. We perform state-of the-art morphology-based research using specialized microscopes and modern laboratory techniques to probe the neuropathological, biochemical and genetic properties of neurodegenerative disease associated proteinopathies. 

Related Links

For a list of Dr. Kovacs's publications, please visit PubMed, Scopus, Publons or ORCID.

Principal Investigator Tanz Centre for Research in Neurodegenerative Diseases
Faculty, Edmond J. Safra Program in Parkinson's Disease, University Health Network & University of Toronto
Co-Director, Rossy Program for PSP Research, University Health Network & University of Toronto
Professor, Department of Laboratory Medicine and Pathobiology, University of Toronto 
Consultant Neuropathologist, Laboratory Medicine Program, University Health Network