Brandon Holmes, MD, PhD

Assistant Professor
[email protected]
+1 415 353-2273

Brandon Holmes, MD, PhD, is an Assistant Professor at the Memory and Aging Center (MAC). He completed his clinical fellowship at the MAC and his post-doctoral research in the Department of Pharmaceutical Chemistry in the laboratory of James A. Wells, PhD, where he studies how microglia, the innate immune cells of the central nervous system, alter their proteome in the context of neurodegeneration and neuroinflammation. Learn more about his research here.

He graduated from Oberlin College with a bachelor’s degree in neuroscience and earned his MD/PhD degrees from Washington University in St. Louis. His dissertation work focused on elucidating the molecular mechanisms that govern the cellular internalization and transmission of tau aggregates from neuron to neuron. He completed his neurology residency at UCSF in 2021.

Brandon spends his free time hiking, playing drums, traveling and BBQing with his family. 

Publications: 

An isolated ruptured spinal aneurysm presents with a thalamic Infarct: case report.

BMC neurology

Tenorio A, Holmes BB, Abla AA, Amans M, Meisel K

A synthetic heparinoid blocks Tau aggregate cell uptake and amplification.

The Journal of biological chemistry

Stopschinski BE, Thomas TL, Nadji S, Darvish E, Fan L, Holmes BB, Modi AR, Finnell JG, Kashmer OM, Estill-Terpack S, Mirbaha H, Luu HS, Diamond MI

Adult-Onset Subacute Sclerosing Panencephalitis With a 30-Year Latent Period.

The Neurohospitalist

Holmes BB, Conell-Price J, Kreple CJ, Ashraf D, Betjemann J, Rosendale N

Parkinson's disease and multiple system atrophy have distinct a-synuclein seed characteristics.

The Journal of biological chemistry

Yamasaki TR, Holmes BB, Furman JL, Dhavale DD, Su BW, Song ES, Cairns NJ, Kotzbauer PT, Diamond MI

Specific glycosaminoglycan chain length and sulfation patterns are required for cell uptake of tau versus a-synuclein and ß-amyloid aggregates.

The Journal of biological chemistry

Stopschinski BE, Holmes BB, Miller GM, Manon VA, Vaquer-Alicea J, Prueitt WL, Hsieh-Wilson LC, Diamond MI

Vertebrobasilar Dolichoectasia Causing An Optic Tract Syndrome.

Journal of neuro-ophthalmology : the official journal of the North American Neuro-Ophthalmology Society

Holmes BB, Green WC, Kung NH, Goebel JA, Van Stavern GP

Cellular Models for the Study of Prions.

Cold Spring Harbor perspectives in medicine

Holmes BB, Diamond MI

Tau reduction prevents neuronal loss and reverses pathological tau deposition and seeding in mice with tauopathy.

Science translational medicine

DeVos SL, Miller RL, Schoch KM, Holmes BB, Kebodeaux CS, Wegener AJ, Chen G, Shen T, Tran H, Nichols B, Zanardi TA, Kordasiewicz HB, Swayze EE, Bennett CF, Diamond MI, Miller TM

Heparan sulfate proteoglycans mediate Aß-induced oxidative stress and hypercontractility in cultured vascular smooth muscle cells.

Molecular neurodegeneration

Reynolds MR, Singh I, Azad TD, Holmes BB, Verghese PB, Dietrich HH, Diamond M, Bu G, Han BH, Zipfel GJ

Sensitive Detection of Proteopathic Seeding Activity with FRET Flow Cytometry.

Journal of visualized experiments : JoVE

Furman JL, Holmes BB, Diamond MI

Tau Trimers Are the Minimal Propagation Unit Spontaneously Internalized to Seed Intracellular Aggregation.

The Journal of biological chemistry

Mirbaha H, Holmes BB, Sanders DW, Bieschke J, Diamond MI

Proteopathic tau seeding predicts tauopathy in vivo.

Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America

Holmes BB, Furman JL, Mahan TE, Yamasaki TR, Mirbaha H, Eades WC, Belaygorod L, Cairns NJ, Holtzman DM, Diamond MI

Heparan sulfate proteoglycans mediate internalization and propagation of specific proteopathic seeds.

Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America

Holmes BB, DeVos SL, Kfoury N, Li M, Jacks R, Yanamandra K, Ouidja MO, Brodsky FM, Marasa J, Bagchi DP, Kotzbauer PT, Miller TM, Papy-Garcia D, Diamond MI

An N-terminal nuclear export signal regulates trafficking and aggregation of Huntingtin (Htt) protein exon 1.

The Journal of biological chemistry

Zheng Z, Li A, Holmes BB, Marasa JC, Diamond MI

Cellular mechanisms of protein aggregate propagation.

Current opinion in neurology

Holmes BB, Diamond MI

Macrophage migration inhibitory factor acts as a neurotrophin in the developing inner ear.

Development (Cambridge, England)

Bank LM, Bianchi LM, Ebisu F, Lerman-Sinkoff D, Smiley EC, Shen YC, Ramamurthy P, Thompson DL, Roth TM, Beck CR, Flynn M, Teller RS, Feng L, Llewellyn GN, Holmes B, Sharples C, Coutinho-Budd J, Linn SA, Chervenak AP, Dolan DF, Benson J, Kanicki A, Martin CA, Altschuler R, Koch AE, Koch AE, Jewett EM, Germiller JA, Barald KF

Trans-cellular propagation of Tau aggregation by fibrillar species.

The Journal of biological chemistry

Kfoury N, Holmes BB, Jiang H, Holtzman DM, Diamond MI

In vivo microdialysis reveals age-dependent decrease of brain interstitial fluid tau levels in P301S human tau transgenic mice.

The Journal of neuroscience : the official journal of the Society for Neuroscience

Yamada K, Cirrito JR, Stewart FR, Jiang H, Finn MB, Holmes BB, Binder LI, Mandelkow EM, Diamond MI, Lee VM, Holtzman DM