Khalid Iqbal

Biography

Khalid Iqbal, Ph.D., is Professor and Chairman of Neurochemistry at the New York State Institute for Basic Research in Developmental Disabilities, Staten Island, New York. He received his Ph.D. in Biochemistry in 1969 from the University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh, U.K. He is a Founder and Chairman of the International Conference on Alzheimer Disease and Related Disorders (ICAD). In 2007, Alzheimer’s Association, USA, established a Khalid Iqbal Life Time Achievement Award for Alzheimer’s disease Research, which is given out annually at the Alzheimer’s Association International Conference (AAIC).

Research Interest

In 1986 he, along with Dr. Inge Grundke-Iqbal, discovered the presence of all six molecular isoforms of tau protein in PHF and showed that tau in PHF is abnormally hyperphosphorylated. The same year, Dr. Iqbal was the first to show that the abnormally hyperphosphorylated tau in the AD brain cytosol inhibited the in vitro microtubule assembly. In 1993, his laboratory discovered a specific decrease in the activities of protein phosphatases (PP) -2 and PP-1 in AD brain. His pioneering studies on neuronal protein pathology and discoveries of tau protein and its abnormal hyperphosphorylation in Alzheimer disease has won him many prestigious honors and awards, including the Potamkin Prize for Alzheimer Disease research from the American Academy of Neurology, and the Zenith Award from the Alzheimer’s Association, USA.