Chief Science Advisor
Chair, Scientific and Clinical Advisory Board

Michael A. Rogawski, a professor of neurology and pharmacology at the University of California Davis, is an internationally recognized expert on drug discovery and development for epilepsy. His research encompasses laboratory studies as well as clinical trials in posttraumatic epilepsy. Studies conducted by Dr. Rogawski on AMPA receptors and neurosteroids have led to new treatment approaches for seizures and epilepsy, and the marketed treatment for postpartum depression brexanolone (Zulresso™). Dr. Rogawski has authored more than 275 research papers, reviews, and book chapters, and edited five books. He received the NIH Director’s Award; the Epilepsy Research Award for Outstanding Contributions to the Pharmacology of Antiepileptic Drugs from the American Society for Pharmacology and Experimental Therapeutics; and the American Academy of Neurology Neuroendocrine Research Award. He is an elected fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, and in 2019 received the UC Davis Chancellor’s Innovator of the Year Award.

Dr. Rogawski graduated from Amherst College with a B.A. in biophysics and from Yale University with an M.D. and Ph.D. in pharmacology. He completed postdoctoral training in the Laboratory of Neurophysiology at the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke and residency training in neurology at Johns Hopkins. Until 2006, he was senior investigator and chief of the Epilepsy Research Section at NINDS and subsequently was appointed chair of the Department of Neurology at UC Davis. He has served on the board of directors of the American Epilepsy Society and as an advisor to the NIH and the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. He is past president of the American Society for Experimental Neurotherapeutics.