Jean-Christophe Rochet

Professor Jen-Christophe Rochet holds his Ph.D. from the Department of Biochemistry at the University of Alberta (Edmonton, Canada, where his thesis research focused on the catalytic mechanism and folding properties of the mitochondrial enzyme CoA transferase. From 1999-2002, Dr. Rochet worked as a postdoctoral fellow with Dr. Peter Lansbury in the Department of Neurology at Harvard Medical School. His postdoctoral research (supported by fellowships from the Human Frontier Science Program Organization and the Alberta Heritage Foundation for Medical Research) focused on the role of alpha-synuclein self-assembly in Parkinson’s disease. In the fall of 2002, he joined the Department of Medicinal Chemistry and Molecular Pharmacology at Purdue University, where he is now an associate professor.

The overall goals of his research program are to understand mechanisms of neurotoxicity and neuroprotection in Parkinson’s disease by characterizing Parkinson’s disease-related gene products (e.g. alpha-synuclein, DJ-1), and to use this information to develop new therapeutic strategies. Dr. Rochet’s honors include a New Investigator Award from the American Association of Colleges of Pharmacy, a Melvin Yahr Fellowship from the International Federation of Parkinson’s disease and a PhRMA Foundation Sabbatical Fellowship in Pharmacology and Toxicology.