Professor John Hardy is a geneticist and molecular biologist whose research interests focus on neurological disease. Dr. Hardy received his B.Sc. (Hons) degree from the University of Leeds, UK (1976) and his Ph.D. from Imperial College, London, UK where he studied dopamine and amino acid neuropharmacology. Dr. Hardy received his postdoctoral training at the MRC Neuropathogenesis Unit in Newcastle upon Tyne, UK and then further postdoctoral work at the Swedish Brain Bank in Umeå, Sweden where he started to work on Alzheimer’s disease.

He became Assistant Professor of Biochemistry at St. Mary’s Hospital, Imperial College, London in 1985 and initiated genetic studies of Alzheimer’s disease whilst there. He was appointed Associate Professor in 1989 and then took the Pfeiffer Endowed Chair of Alzheimer’s Research at the University of South Florida, in Tampa in 1992. In 1996 he moved to the Mayo Clinic in Jacksonville, Florida, as Consultant and Professor of Neuroscience. He became Chair of Neuroscience in 2000 and moved to NIA as Chief of the Laboratory of Neurogenetics in 2001. He won the MetLife, the Allied Signal and the Potamkin Prize for his work in describing the first genetic mutations, in the amyloid gene in Alzheimer’s disease, in 1991. From 2001 to 2007, he was Head of the Neurogenetics Section, National Institute of Ageing, Bethesda, USA.

In 2007, he took up the Chair of Molecular Biology of Neurological Disease at the UCL Institute of Neurology. With over 23,000 citations, Prof Hardy is the most cited Alzheimer’s disease researcher in the UK (5th internationally). In recognition of his exceptional contributions to science, he was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society in 2009.

Honours and Awards

  • 1991 Peter Debje Prize, University of Limburg, Belgium, For Alzheimer’s Research
  • 1992 IPSEN Prize for Research into Alzheimer’s Disease
  • 1993 Potamkin Prize (American Academy of Neurology) for Alzheimer’s Research
  • 1995 Allied Signal Prize for Research into Aging
  • 1995 MetLife Prize for Research into Alzheimer’s disease
  • 2002 Kaul Prize for Research into Alzheimer’s disease
  • 2008 Anne Marie Oprecht International Prize for Research in Parkinson’s Disease
  • 2008 Elected to membership of the Academy of Medical Sciences
  • 2008 Honorary MD, University of Umea, Sweden
  • 2009 Elected to the Royal Society

Scientific publications

  1. Van Deerlin VM, Sleiman PMA, Martinez-Lage M, et al. Common variants at 7p21 are associated with frontotemporal lobar degeneration with TDP43 inclusions Nature Genetics 2010; 42: 234-U34.
  2. Harold D, Abraham R, Hollingworth P, et al. Genome-wide association study identifies variants at CLU and PICALM associated with Alzheimer’s disease. Nature Genetics 2009;41:088-U61.
  3. Simon-Sanchez J, Schulte C, Bras JM; et al. Genome-wide association study reveals genetic risk underlying Parkinson’s disease. Nature Genetics 2009;41:1308-U68.
  4. Hardy J, Singleton A. Genomewide Association Studies and Human Disease. New England Journal of Medicine 2009;360:1759-1768.
  5. Nalls MA, Guerreiro RJ, Simon-Sanchez J, Bras JT, Traynor BJ, Gibbs JR, Launer L, Hardy J, Singleton AB. Extended tracts of homozygosity identify novel candidate genes associated with late-onset Alzheimer’s disease. Neurogenetics. 2009;10:183-90.
  6. Zody MC, Jiang Z, Fung HC, et al. Evolutionary toggling of the MAPT 17q21.31 inversion region. Nature Genetics 2008;40:1076-1083.
  7. Jakobsson M, Scholz SW, Scheet P, et al. Genotype, haplotype and copy-number variation in worldwide human populations Nature 2008;451:998-1003.
  8. Matarin M, Simon-Sanchez J, Fung HC, et al. Structural genomic variation in ischemic stroke. Neurogenetics 2008;9:101-108.
  9. Myers AJ, Gibbs R, Webster J, Rohrer K, Zhao A, Marlowe L, Kaleem M, Leung D, Bryden L, Nath P, Zismann VL, Joshipura K, Huentelman MJ, Hu- Lince D, Coon KD, Craig DW, Pearson JV, Holmans P, Heward CB, Reiman EM, Stephan D, Hardy J. A survey of genetic cortical gene expression. Nature Genetics 2007;39:1494-9.
  10. Reiman EM, Webster JA, Myers AJ, Hardy J, Dunckley T, Zismann VL, Joshipura KD, Pearson JV, Hu-Lince D, Huentelman MJ, Craig DW, Coon KD, Liang WS, Herbert RH, Beach T, Rohrer KC, Zhao AS, Leung D, Bryden L, Marlowe L, Kaleem M, Mastroeni D, Grover A, Heward CB, Ravid R, Rogers J, Hutton ML, Melquist S, Petersen RC, Alexander GE, Caselli RJ, Kukull W, Papassotiropoulos A, Stephan DA. GAB2 alleles modify Alzheimer’s risk in APOE epsilon4 carriers. Neuron. 2007;54:713-20.