Katie Hood
CEO, The Michael J. Fox Foundation for Parkinson's Research

Katie Hood joined The Michael J. Fox Foundation for Parkinson's Research (MJFF) in September 2002 and was named Chief Executive Officer in December 2007. She has played critical roles in shaping MJFF's strategy of intervening aggressively to close critical gaps that slow potential treatments on their path from the laboratory to Parkinson's patients, as well as in building a team of in-house research experts needed to implement that strategy.

Since its inception in November 2000 the Foundation has emerged as one of a handful of medical research foundations not only driving high-impact research in their respective disease fields, but launching initiatives that promote substantial change to the scientific enterprise as a whole, in pursuit of faster progress toward tangible therapeutic advances. Today the Foundation stands as the single largest Parkinson's research funder in the world outside the U.S. government, having funded $154 million in PD research as of October 2009.

In August 2008, Ms. Hood was named to the Advisory Council to the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke (NINDS), an 18-member board that advises the U.S. Secretary of Health and Human Services, the director of the National Institutes of Health, and the director of NINDS on research funding prioritization and related matters for neurological diseases, including Parkinson's disease. She also is a member of the Board of Directors of the Parkinson's Action Network (PAN).

Prior to joining the Foundation, Ms. Hood was employed as a consultant at Bain & Company in New York City and as an analyst at Goldman, Sachs & Co. She graduated from Harvard Business School and holds a BA in Public Policy Studies from Duke University in Durham, North Carolina.