UCSF’s innovative, collaborative approach to patient care, research and education spans disciplines across the life sciences, making it a world leader in scientific discovery and its translation to improving health.
Alex started at the Memory and Aging Center as a staff researcher in the lab of Prof. Lea T. Grinberg in 2013. There, he developed interests in the factors that influence selective vulnerability and resilience at the early stages of Alzheimer’s disease and the neuropsychiatric manifestations associated with those stages. He now has dual roles as a researcher in the Grinberg lab and as a Ph.D. candidate in the Dept. of Integrative Biology in the lab of Prof. Daniela Kaufer at UC Berkeley's Helen Wills Neuroscience Institute.
Fanny Elahi is a board-certified neurologist with specific expertise in the evaluation and management of patients with cognitive and behavioral disorders due to degenerative brain diseases such as Alzheimer's disease and related disorders. She completed her bachelor's degree at Columbia University, her MD from Icahn School of Medicine, at Mount Sinai, and her DPhil from Oxford University.
Emma received her BA degree in biology from Swarthmore College in 2017. While at Swarthmore, she developed an interest in public health, which lead to her research on methods used by medical professionals to combat the stigma of schizophrenia in Valparaíso, Chile. After working as a medical scribe at CityMD in New York City for one year, she returned to her native Bay Area. At the Memory and Aging Center, Emma assists families with the donation process and acts as Dr. Bill Seeley’s administrative assistant.
Dr. Michael Erkkinen received his medical degree from Dartmouth College. He completed an internship in Internal Medicine at the Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston, residency in Neurology at the combined Massachusetts General Hospital and Brigham and Women’s Program, and fellowships in Cognitive and Behavioral Neurology at the UCSF Memory and Aging Center and Brigham and Women’s Hospital. He was on the faculty at Harvard Medical School until 2020, when he re-joined the Memory and Aging Center team to serve as the clinic’s medical director.
Sabrina Erlhoff manages the development and implementation of the TabCAT software platform. TabCAT is a technologically and scientifically robust system for the administration of novel cognitive and behavioral assessment measures aimed at advancing early detection and monitoring of neurocognitive disorders developed by Dr. Kate Possin.
Investigates the neurobiological mechanisms of language processing in neurodegenerative disease using multimodal imaging, and collaborates with UT Austin’s Aphasia Research and Treatment Laboratory to explore treatment-induced neural and behavioral changes in primary progressive aphasia (PPA).
Ryan Fitch is the data manager for the Memory and Aging Center. Stability, support, and automating the boring stuff is his passion. When he is not attempting creative coding solutions or contemplating the component parts of cross-functional workflows, he can be found climbing mountains and running half marathons.
He completed his BS degree in cell biology and molecular genetics from the University of Maryland, College Park and is wrapping up his MS degree in bioinformatics at Johns Hopkins University.
