Adam Christian Naj, PhD
Associate Professor of Epidemiology in Biostatistics and Epidemiology at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania
Senior Scholar, Center for Clinical Epidemiology and Biostatistics, Perelman School of Medicine
Department: Biostatistics and Epidemiology
Graduate Group Affiliations
Contact information
921 Blockley Hall
423 Guardian Drive
Philadelphia, PA 19104
423 Guardian Drive
Philadelphia, PA 19104
Office: (215) 746-4180
Fax: (215) 573-1050
Lab: (215) 746-4180
Fax: (215) 573-1050
Lab: (215) 746-4180
Email:
adamnaj@mail.med.upenn.edu
adamnaj@mail.med.upenn.edu
Publications
Links
Search PubMed for articles
Penn Neurodegeneration Genomics Center
Research Gate
NIA Genetics of Alzheimer's Disease Data Storage Site (NIAGADS)
Google Scholar
Collaborator Page for the National Human Genome Research Institute (NHGRI) Alzheimer's Disease Sequencing Project (ADSP)
Search PubMed for articles
Penn Neurodegeneration Genomics Center
Research Gate
NIA Genetics of Alzheimer's Disease Data Storage Site (NIAGADS)
Google Scholar
Collaborator Page for the National Human Genome Research Institute (NHGRI) Alzheimer's Disease Sequencing Project (ADSP)
Education:
BA (Biology (Genetics)/Psychology)
University of Chicago, 2000.
PhD (Epidemiology (Human Genetics))
The Johns Hopkins University Bloomberg School of Public Health, 2008.
Permanent linkBA (Biology (Genetics)/Psychology)
University of Chicago, 2000.
PhD (Epidemiology (Human Genetics))
The Johns Hopkins University Bloomberg School of Public Health, 2008.
Description of Research Expertise
Dr. Naj is an Assistant Professor of Epidemiology in the Department of Biostatistics, Epidemiology, and Informatics, and the Department of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania Perelman School of Medicine. His research focuses primarily on the genetics of Alzheimer’s Disease (AD) and neurodegeneration, including his genome-wide association analyses in the Alzheimer’s Disease Genetics Consortium (ADGC) which resulted in a first-author paper that was the most cited Alzheimer’s study of 2011. Joining Penn in 2012, Dr. Naj has extended his roles in analysis and data management in the ADGC, and has been actively co-leading quality control and case-control analysis working groups in the Alzheimer’s Disease Sequencing Project (ADSP), which has collected data on nearly 600 whole genomes and more than 10,500 whole exomes of AD cases and controls to identify rare risk-increasing and protective genomic variants contributing to AD. Of late his work has included guiding development of a quality control pipeline for next-generation sequence data as part of the Genomic Center on Alzheimer’s Disease (GCAD). Dr. Naj is also one of several Penn co-founders and organizers of the annual Symposium on Advances in Genetic Epidemiology and Statistics (SAGES), promoting the development of methods to analyze genomic datasets. He has recently expanded his research portfolio to include studies examining genetic loci contributing to multiple neurodegenerative diseases and phenotypes including AD, Parkinson’s disease, and progressive supranuclear palsy, among others, aspiring to identify key genetic contributors to the pathologies underlying neurodgeneration.Selected Publications
Kovacs GG, Katsumata Y, Wu X, Aung KZ, Fardo DW, Forrest SL; Alzheimer's Disease Genetics Consortium; Nelson PT.: Amyloid-β predominant Alzheimer's disease neuropathologic change. Brain 148: 401-407, Feb 2025.Durant A, Mukherjee S, Lee ML, Choi SE, Scollard P, Klinedinst BS, Trittschuh EH, Mez J, Farrer LA, Gifford KA, Cruchaga C, Hassenstab J, Naj AC, Wang LS, Johnson SC, Engelman CD, Kukull WA, Keene CD, Saykin AJ, Cuccaro ML, Kunkle BW, Pericak-Vance MA, Martin ER, Bennett DA, Barnes LL, Schneider JA, Bush WS, Haines JL, Mayeux R, Vardarajan BN, Albert MS, Thompson PM, Jefferson AL; Alzheimer’s Disease Neuroimaging Initiative (ADNI); Alzheimer’s Disease Genetics Consortium (ADGC), The Alzheimer’s Disease Sequencing Project (ADSP); Crane PK, Dumitrescu L, Archer DB, Hohman TJ, Gaynor LS.: Evaluating the association of APOE genotype and cognitive resilience in SuperAgers. medRxiv Jan 2025.
Rajabli F, Benchek P, Tosto G, Kushch N, Sha J, Bazemore K, Zhu C, Lee WP, Haut J, Hamilton-Nelson KL, Wheeler NR, Zhao Y, Farrell JJ, Grunin MA, Leung YY, Kuksa PP, Li D, Lucio da Fonseca E, Mez JB, Palmer EL, Pillai J, Sherva RM, Song YE, Zhang X, Iqbal T, Pathak O, Valladares O, Kuzma AB, Abner E, Adams PM, Aguirre A, Albert MS, Albin RL, Allen M, Alvarez L, Apostolova LG, Arnold SE, Asthana S, Atwood CS, Ayres G, Baldwin CT, Barber RC, Barnes LL, Barral S, Beach TG, Becker JT, Beecham GW, Beekly D, Benitez BA, Bennett D, Bertelson J, Bird TD, Blacker D, Boeve BF, Bowen JD, Boxer A, Brewer J, Burke JR, Burns JM, Buxbaum JD, Cairns NJ, Cantwell LB, Cao C, Carlson CS, Carlsson CM, Carney RM, Carrasquillo MM, Chasse S, Chesselet MF, Chin NA, Chui HC, Chung J, Craft S, Crane PK, Cribbs DH, Crocco EA, Cruchaga C, Cuccaro ML, Cullum M, Darby E, Davis B, De Jager PL, DeCarli C, DeToledo J, Dick M, Dickson DW, Dombroski BA, Doody RS, Duara R, Ertekin-Taner N, Evans DA, Faber KM, Fairchild TJ, Fallon KB, Fardo DW, Farlow MR, Fernandez-Hernandez V, Ferris S, Foroud TM, Frosch MP, Fulton-Howard B, Galasko DR, Gamboa A, Gearing M, Geschwind DH, Ghetti B, Gilbert JR, Goate AM, Grabowski TJ, Graff-Radford NR, Green RC, Growdon JH, Hakonarson H, Hall J, Hamilton RL, Harari O, Hardy J, Harrell LE, Head E, Henderson VW, Hernandez M, Hohman T, Honig LS, Huebinger RM, Huentelman MJ, Hulette CM, Hyman BT, Hynan LS, Ibanez L, Jarvik GP, Jayadev S, Jin LW, Johnson K, Johnson L, Kamboh MI, Karydas AM, Katz MJ, Kauwe JS, Kaye JA, Keene CD, Khaleeq A, Kim R, Knebl J, Kowall NW, Kramer JH, Kukull WA, LaFerla FM, Lah JJ, Larson EB, Lerner A, Leverenz JB, Levey AI, Lieberman AP, Lipton RB, Logue M, Lopez OL, Lunetta KL, Lyketsos CG, Mains D, Margaret FE, Marson DC, Martin ERR, Martiniuk F, Mash DC, Masliah E, Massman P, Masurkar A, McCormick WC, McCurry SM, McDavid AN, McDonough S, McKee AC, Mesulam M, Miller BL, Miller CA, Miller JW, Montine TJ, Monuki ES, Morris JC, Mukherjee S, Myers AJ, Nguyen T, O'Bryant S, Olichney JM, Ory M, Palmer R, Parisi JE, Paulson HL, Pavlik V, Paydarfar D, Perez V, Peskind E, Petersen RC, Pierce A, Polk M, Poon WW, Potter H, Qu L, Quiceno M, Quinn JF, Raj A, Raskind M, Reiman EM, Reisberg B, Reisch JS, Ringman JM, Roberson ED, Rodriguear M, Rogaeva E, Rosen HJ, Rosenberg RN, Royall DR, Sager MA, Sano M, Saykin AJ, Schneider JA, Schneider LS, Seeley WW, Slifer SH, Small S, Smith AG, Smith JP, Sonnen JA, Spina S, St George-Hyslop P, Stern RA, Stevens AB, Strittmatter SM, Sultzer D, Swerdlow RH, Tanzi RE, Tilson JL, Trojanowski JQ, Troncoso JC, Tsuang DW, Van Deerlin VM, van Eldik LJ, Vance JM, Vardarajan BN, Vassar R, Vinters HV, Vonsattel JP, Weintraub S, Welsh-Bohmer KA, Whitehead PL, Wijsman EM, Wilhelmsen KC, Williams B, Williamson J, Wilms H, Wingo TS, Wisniewski T, Woltjer RL, Woon M, Wright CB, Wu CK, Younkin SG, Yu CE, Yu L, Zhu X, Kunkle BW, Bush WS, Wang LS, Farrer LA, Haines JL, Mayeux R, Pericak-Vance MA, Schellenberg GD, Jun GR, Reitz C, Naj AC.: Multi-ancestry genome-wide meta-analysis of 56,241 individuals identifies LRRC4C, LHX5-AS1 and nominates ancestry-specific loci PTPRK, GRB14, and KIAA0825 as novel risk loci for Alzheimer's disease: the Alzheimer's Disease Genetics Consortium. Genome Biology Page: (online ahead of print), 2025.
Leung YY, Lee WP, Kuzma AB, Nicaretta H, Valladares O, Gangadharan P, Qu L, Zhao Y, Ren Y, Cheng PL, Kuksa PP, Wang H, White H, Katanic Z, Bass L, Saravanan N, Greenfest-Allen E, Kirsch M, Cantwell L, Iqbal T, Wheeler NR, Farrell JJ, Zhu C, Turner SL, Gunasekaran TI, Mena PR, Jin J, Carter L; Alzheimer’s Disease Sequencing Project; Zhang X, Vardarajan BN, Toga A, Cuccaro M, Hohman TJ, Bush WS, Naj AC, Martin E, Dalgard C, Kunkle BW, Farrer LA, Mayeux RP, Haines JL, Pericak-Vance MA, Schellenberg GD, Wang LS.: Alzheimer's Disease Sequencing Project Release 4 Whole Genome Sequencing Dataset. medRxiv Dec 2024.
Kuzma A, Valladares O, Greenfest-Allen E, Nicaretta H, Kirsch M, Ren Y, Katanic Z, White H, Wilk A, Bass L, Brettschneider J, Carter L, Cifello J, Chuang WH, Clark K, Gangadharan P, Haut J, Ho PC, Horng W, Iqbal T, Jin Y, Keskinen P, Rose AL, Moon MK, Manuel J, Qu L, Robbins F, Saravanan N, Sha J, Tate S, Zhao Y; Alzheimer’s Disease Sequencing Project; Cantwell L, Gardner J, Chou SY, Tzeng JY, Bush W, Naj A, Kuksa P, Lee WP, Leung YY, Schellenberg G, Wang LS.: NIAGADS: A Comprehensive National Data Repository for Alzheimer's Disease and Related Dementia Genetics and Genomics Research. medRxiv Dec 2024.
Lee WP, Choi SH, Shea MG, Cheng PL, Dombroski BA, Pitsillides AN, Heard-Costa NL, Wang H, Bulekova K, Kuzma AB, Leung YY, Farrell JJ, Lin H, Kunkle BW, Naj A, Blue EE, Nusetor F, Wang D, Boerwinkle E, Bush WS, Zhang X, De Jager PL, Dupuis J, Farrer LA, Fornage M, Martin E, Pericak-Vance M, Seshadri S, Wijsman EM, Wang LS; Alzheimer's Disease Sequencing Project; Schellenberg GD, Destefano AL, Haines JL, Peloso GM.: Association of common and rare variants with Alzheimer's disease in more than 13,000 diverse individuals with whole-genome sequencing from the Alzheimer's Disease Sequencing Project. Alzheimer's & Dementia 20(12): 8470-8483, December 2024.
Le Borgne J, Gomez L, Heikkinen S, Amin N, Ahmad S, Choi SH, Bis J, Grenier-Boley B, Rodriguez OG, Kleineidam L, Young J, Tripathi KP, Wang L, Varma A, Campos-Martin R, van der Lee S, Damotte V, de Rojas I, Palmal S; EADB, GR@ACE, DEGESCO, EADI, GERAD, DemGene, FinnGen, ADGC, CHARGE; Lipton R, Reiman E, McKee A, De Jager P, Bush W, Small S, Levey A, Saykin A, Foroud T, Albert M, Hyman B, Petersen R, Younkin S, Sano M, Wisniewski T, Vassar R, Schneider J, Henderson V, Roberson E, DeCarli C, LaFerla F, Brewer J, Swerdlow R, Van Eldik L, Hamilton-Nelson K, Paulson H, Naj A, Lopez O, Chui H, Crane P, Grabowski T, Kukull W, Asthana S, Craft S, Strittmatter S, Cruchaga C, Leverenz J, Goate A, Kamboh MI, George-Hyslop PS, Valladares O, Kuzma A, Cantwell L, Riemenschneider M, Morris J, Slifer S, Dalmasso C, Castillo A, Küçükali F, Peters O, Schneider A, Dichgans M, Rujescu D, Scherbaum N, Deckert J, Riedel-Heller S, Hausner L, Molina-Porcel L, Düzel E, Grimmer T, Wiltfang J, Heilmann-Heimbach S, Moebus S, Tegos T, Scarmeas N, Dols-Icardo O, Moreno F, Pérez-Tur J, Bullido MJ, Pastor P, Sánchez-Valle R, Álvarez V, Boada M, García-González P, Puerta R, Mir P, Real LM, Piñol-Ripoll G, García-Alberca JM, Royo JL, et al.: X-chromosome-wide association study for Alzheimer's disease. Molecular Psychiatry Dec 2024 Notes: (online ahead of print).
Farrell K, Humphrey J, Chang T, Zhao Y, Leung YY, Kuksa PP, Patil V, Lee WP, Kuzma AB, Valladares O, Cantwell LB, Wang H, Ravi A, De Sanctis C, Han N, Christie TD, Afzal R, Kandoi S, Whitney K, Krassner MM, Ressler H, Kim S, Dangoor D, Iida MA, Casella A, Walker RH, Nirenberg MJ, Renton AE, Babrowicz B, Coppola G, Raj T, Höglinger GU, Müller U, Golbe LI, Morris HR, Hardy J, Revesz T, Warner TT, Jaunmuktane Z, Mok KY, Rademakers R, Dickson DW, Ross OA, Wang LS, Goate A, Schellenberg G, Geschwind DH; PSP Genetics Study Group; Crary JF, Naj A.: Genetic, transcriptomic, histological, and biochemical analysis of progressive supranuclear palsy implicates glial activation and novel risk genes. Nature Communications 15: 7880, Sep 2024.
Wang H, Chang TS, Dombroski BA, Cheng PL, Patil V, Valiente-Banuet L, Farrell K, Mclean C, Molina-Porcel L, Rajput A, De Deyn PP, Le Bastard N, Gearing M, Kaat LD, Van Swieten JC, Dopper E, Ghetti BF, Newell KL, Troakes C, de Yébenes JG, Rábano-Gutierrez A, Meller T, Oertel WH, Respondek G, Stamelou M, Arzberger T, Roeber S, Müller U, Hopfner F, Pastor P, Brice A, Durr A, Le Ber I, Beach TG, Serrano GE, Hazrati LN, Litvan I, Rademakers R, Ross OA, Galasko D, Boxer AL, Miller BL, Seeley WW, Van Deerlin VM, Lee EB, White CL 3rd, Morris H, de Silva R, Crary JF, Goate AM, Friedman JS, Leung YY, Coppola G, Naj AC, Wang LS; P. S. P. genetics study group; Dalgard C, Dickson DW, Höglinger GU, Schellenberg GD, Geschwind DH, Lee WP.: Whole-genome sequencing analysis reveals new susceptibility loci and structural variants associated with progressive supranuclear palsy. Molecular Neurodegeneration 19(1): 61, Aug 2024.
Mega Vascular Cognitive Impairment and Dementia (MEGAVCID) Consortium: A genome-wide association meta-analysis of all-cause and vascular dementia. Alzheimer's & Dementia 20(9): 5973–5995, July 2024.