The Parker Family Professorship of Neurology

Established in 2002 by the gift of John E. Parker and his wife, Patricia Parker, the purpose of the chair is to continue Penn’s tradition of pioneering research in neurology.

The Parkers and their friend William Kaplan co-founded A.C. Moore Arts and Crafts in 1984, playing leadership roles in the company until their retirement in 2006. The Parkers have generously supported the neurosciences at Penn with gifts to fund neuro-imaging resources and to establish the Parker Family Foundation ADHD Emerging Adult Project. Mr. Parker has served on the Penn Medicine Comprehensive Neuroscience Center Leadership Council and the Penn Medicine Board.

The first in America, the Department of Neurology at the Perelman School of Medicine is today the best in the region and among the finest in the nation. Its renowned faculty continues to expand the Department’s mission of research, education, and care. The first Parker Family Professor, Matthew B. Stern, MD, co-founded the Parkinson’s Disease and Movement Disorders Center (PD&MDC) at Pennsylvania Hospital in 1982. Dr. Stern created the Center because he saw the need to offer comprehensive care and develop research-based treatments to improve the quality of life for patients with Parkinsonian disorders. Today the PD&MDC is recognized by the National Parkinson Foundation as one of 45 centers of excellence worldwide.

Current Chairholder
Alice S. Chen-Plotkin, MD

A Phi Beta Kappa graduate and English literature major at Harvard University, Dr. Chen-Plotkin began her scientific training as a Rhodes Scholar at Oxford University. She subsequently returned to Harvard for medical school and neurology training, moved to the University of Pennsylvania for fellowship training, and joined the faculty at the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania in 2010. Dr. Chen-Plotkin’s research focuses on understanding the mechanisms of neurodegenerative diseases such as Parkinson’s disease, Alzheimer’s disease, amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, and frontotemporal dementia. In particular, she uses large-scale screens of patient samples to generate leads, and then follows these leads in cell-based and animal-model systems. For her research, she has won major awards from the American Academy of Neurology (2014 Jon Stolk Award for research in Movement Disorders) as well as the American Neurological Association (2018 Derek Denny Brown Award, the highest honor of the ANA). Her experience as a practicing Parkinson’s disease physician informs all of her work, placing emphasis on areas where bench-based results might translate most readily into the clinic.

Previous Chairholders

• Matthew B. Stern, MD, 2003–2016