Rahul Desikan (June 6, 1978 – July 14, 2019) was an Indian-American

neuroscientist A neuroscientist (or neurobiologist) is a scientist specializing in neuroscience that deals with the anatomy and function of neurons, Biological neural network, neural circuits, and glia, and their Behavior, behavioral, biological, and psycholo ...

and neuroradiologist. He was an Assistant Professor of Radiology & Biomedical Imaging, Neurology and Pediatrics at the

University of California, San Francisco The University of California, San Francisco (UCSF) is a Public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in San Francisco, California, United States. It is part of the University of California system and is dedic ...

, and co-director of Laboratory for Precision Neuroimaging. Desikan's achievements became publicly known in a ''

Washington Post ''The Washington Post'', locally known as ''The'' ''Post'' and, informally, ''WaPo'' or ''WP'', is an American daily newspaper published in Washington, D.C., the national capital. It is the most widely circulated newspaper in the Washington m ...

'' article detailing his lifelong commitment to preventing and treating

Alzheimer's disease Alzheimer's disease (AD) is a neurodegenerative disease and the cause of 60–70% of cases of dementia. The most common early symptom is difficulty in remembering recent events. As the disease advances, symptoms can include problems wit ...

and his continuing work as a scientist living with

Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), also known as motor neuron disease (MND) or—in the United States—Lou Gehrig's disease (LGD), is a rare, Terminal illness, terminal neurodegenerative disease, neurodegenerative disorder that results i ...

(ALS). Desikan was vocal about the need for increased awareness and research funding for

ALS Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), also known as motor neuron disease (MND) or—in the United States—Lou Gehrig's disease (LGD), is a rare, terminal neurodegenerative disorder that results in the progressive loss of both upper and low ...

, and voiced his unique perspective as both ALS researcher and ALS patient in op-ed articles appearing in a regular column in the ''Washington Post'' as well as in the ''

San Francisco Chronicle The ''San Francisco Chronicle'' is a newspaper serving primarily the San Francisco Bay Area of Northern California. It was founded in 1865 as ''The Daily Dramatic Chronicle'' by teenage brothers Charles de Young and M. H. de Young, Michael H. ...

'' and ''

Scientific American ''Scientific American'', informally abbreviated ''SciAm'' or sometimes ''SA'', is an American popular science magazine. Many scientists, including Albert Einstein and Nikola Tesla, have contributed articles to it, with more than 150 Nobel Pri ...

.''

Education and early influences

Desikan graduated from

The Bronx High School of Science The Bronx High School of Science is a State school, public Specialized high schools in New York City, specialized high school in the Bronx in New York City. It is operated by the New York City Department of Education. Admission to Bronx Science ...

, a school for gifted students, in 1995. Desikan completed his BA, MD and PhD training at

Boston University Boston University (BU) is a Private university, private research university in Boston, Massachusetts, United States. BU was founded in 1839 by a group of Boston Methodism, Methodists with its original campus in Newbury (town), Vermont, Newbur ...

, Radiology Residency at

UCSD The University of California, San Diego (UC San Diego in communications material, formerly and colloquially UCSD) is a public land-grant research university in San Diego, California, United States. Established in 1960 near the pre-existing ...

and

Neuroradiology Neuroradiology is a subspecialty of radiology focusing on the diagnosis and characterization of abnormalities of the central and peripheral nervous system, spine, and head and neck using neuroimaging techniques. Medical issues utilizing neurorad ...

Fellowship at

UCSF The University of California, San Francisco (UCSF) is a public land-grant research university in San Francisco, California, United States. It is part of the University of California system and is dedicated entirely to health science and life ...

. He completed postdoctoral fellowships in

Neuroimaging Neuroimaging is the use of quantitative (computational) techniques to study the neuroanatomy, structure and function of the central nervous system, developed as an objective way of scientifically studying the healthy human brain in a non-invasive ...

with Bruce Fischl at the Athinoula A. Martinos Center for Biomedical Imaging at

Massachusetts General Hospital Massachusetts General Hospital (Mass General or MGH) is a teaching hospital located in the West End neighborhood of Boston, Massachusetts. It is the original and largest clinical education and research facility of Harvard Medical School/Harvar ...

and

Neurogenetics Neurogenetics studies the role of genetics in the development and function of the nervous system. It considers neural characteristics as phenotypes (i.e. manifestations, measurable or not, of the genetic make-up of an individual), and is mainly ba ...

with Anders Dale at

Research on neurodegenerative disease

Desikan's work focused on investigating the pathobiology underlying

neurodegenerative A neurodegenerative disease is caused by the progressive loss of neurons, in the process known as neurodegeneration. Neuronal damage may also ultimately result in their death. Neurodegenerative diseases include amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, mul ...

and

neurodevelopmental disorders Neurodevelopmental disorders are a group of mental conditions negatively affecting the development of the nervous system, which includes the human brain, brain and spinal cord. According to the American Psychiatric Association Diagnostic and Sta ...

. Using '

big data Big data primarily refers to data sets that are too large or complex to be dealt with by traditional data processing, data-processing application software, software. Data with many entries (rows) offer greater statistical power, while data with ...

' acquired through ongoing global collaborations, he innovated a variety of cross disciplinary methods to identify novel risk factors for

brain diseases Central nervous system diseases or central nervous system disorders are a group of neurological disorders that affect the structure or function of the brain or spinal cord, which collectively form the central nervous system (CNS). These disorders ...

Scientific contributions

Desikan's scientific career focused on helping to understand and treat

neurodegenerative diseases A neurodegenerative disease is caused by the progressive loss of neurons, in the process known as neurodegeneration. Neuronal damage may also ultimately result in their death. Neurodegenerative diseases include amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, mul ...

, specifically

. His major scientific contributions included: 1) Development of an automated atlas of the human

cerebral cortex The cerebral cortex, also known as the cerebral mantle, is the outer layer of neural tissue of the cerebrum of the brain in humans and other mammals. It is the largest site of Neuron, neural integration in the central nervous system, and plays ...

(Desikan-Killiany Atlas in

FreeSurfer FreeSurfer is brain List of neuroimaging software, imaging software originally developed by Bruce Fischl, Anders Dale, Martin Sereno, and Doug Greve. Development and maintenance of FreeSurfer is now the primary responsibility of the Laboratory fo ...

), and its role as a quantitative

biomarker In biomedical contexts, a biomarker, or biological marker, is a measurable indicator of some biological state or condition. Biomarkers are often measured and evaluated using blood, urine, or soft tissues to examine normal biological processes, ...

for

neurodegeneration A neurodegenerative disease is caused by the progressive loss of neurons, in the process known as neurodegeneration. Neuronal damage may also ultimately result in their cell death, death. Neurodegenerative diseases include amyotrophic lateral sc ...

. 2) Characterization of the synergistic relationship between

amyloid Amyloids are aggregates of proteins characterised by a fibrillar morphology of typically 7–13 nm in diameter, a β-sheet secondary structure (known as cross-β) and ability to be stained by particular dyes, such as Congo red. In the human ...

and tau pathology in

. 3) Development of the polygenic hazard score (PHS) for predicting

age of onset, in collaboration with Chun Chieh Fan and Anders Dale. A commercial version of PHS, which calculates genetic risk for an individual using genomic data from

23andme 23andMe Holding Co. is an American personal genomics and biotechnology company based in South San Francisco, California. It is best known for providing a direct-to-consumer genetic testing service in which customers provide a saliva testing, sali ...

and

Ancestry.com Ancestry.com LLC is an American genealogy company based in Lehi, Utah. The largest for-profit genealogy company in the world, it operates a network of genealogical, historical records, and related genetic genealogy websites. It is owned by The ...

, is available from Dash Genomics. 4) Helping develop and validate methods to quantify genetic

pleiotropy Pleiotropy () is a condition in which a single gene or genetic variant influences multiple phenotypic traits. A gene that has such multiple effects is referred to as a ''pleiotropic gene''. Mutations in pleiotropic genes can impact several trait ...

. These genetic

methods have provided valuable insights across a number of diseases and identified Novel

Single Nucleotide Polymorphisms In genetics and bioinformatics, a single-nucleotide polymorphism (SNP ; plural SNPs ) is a germline substitution of a single nucleotide at a specific position in the genome. Although certain definitions require the substitution to be present in ...

(SNPs) associated with increased risk for

schizophrenia Schizophrenia () is a mental disorder characterized variously by hallucinations (typically, Auditory hallucination#Schizophrenia, hearing voices), delusions, thought disorder, disorganized thinking and behavior, and Reduced affect display, f ...

bipolar disorder Bipolar disorder (BD), previously known as manic depression, is a mental disorder characterized by periods of Depression (mood), depression and periods of abnormally elevated Mood (psychology), mood that each last from days to weeks, and in ...

Parkinson's disease Parkinson's disease (PD), or simply Parkinson's, is a neurodegenerative disease primarily of the central nervous system, affecting both motor system, motor and non-motor systems. Symptoms typically develop gradually and non-motor issues become ...

frontotemporal dementia Frontotemporal dementia (FTD), also called frontotemporal degeneration disease or frontotemporal neurocognitive disorder, encompasses several types of dementia involving the progressive degeneration of the brain's frontal lobe, frontal and tempor ...

corticobasal degeneration Corticobasal degeneration (CBD) is a rare neurodegenerative disease involving the cerebral cortex and the basal ganglia. CBD symptoms typically begin in people from 50 to 70 years of age, and typical survival before death is eight years. It is cha ...

hypertension Hypertension, also known as high blood pressure, is a Chronic condition, long-term Disease, medical condition in which the blood pressure in the artery, arteries is persistently elevated. High blood pressure usually does not cause symptoms i ...

hypercholesterolemia Hypercholesterolemia, also called high cholesterol, is the presence of high levels of cholesterol in the blood. It is a form of hyperlipidemia (high levels of lipids in the blood), hyperlipoproteinemia (high levels of lipoproteins in the blood), ...

and

coronary artery disease Coronary artery disease (CAD), also called coronary heart disease (CHD), or ischemic heart disease (IHD), is a type of cardiovascular disease, heart disease involving Ischemia, the reduction of blood flow to the cardiac muscle due to a build-up ...

ALS diagnosis

In February 2017, Desikan was diagnosed with

amyotrophic lateral sclerosis Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), also known as motor neuron disease (MND) or—in the United States—Lou Gehrig's disease (LGD), is a rare, Terminal illness, terminal neurodegenerative disease, neurodegenerative disorder that results i ...

, one of the

Neurodegenerative Disease A neurodegenerative disease is caused by the progressive loss of neurons, in the process known as neurodegeneration. Neuronal damage may also ultimately result in their death. Neurodegenerative diseases include amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, mul ...

s that has been the focus of his research. His battle with the disease, both personal and scientific, was featured in ''

The Washington Post ''The Washington Post'', locally known as ''The'' ''Post'' and, informally, ''WaPo'' or ''WP'', is an American daily newspaper published in Washington, D.C., the national capital. It is the most widely circulated newspaper in the Washington m ...

'', in a cover story by reporter Laurie McGinley. Unable to speak, walk or use his hands, Desikan continued to pursue research and published more than 25 papers after his diagnosis. His final work focused on development of a

cardiovascular In vertebrates, the circulatory system is a system of organs that includes the heart, blood vessels, and blood which is circulated throughout the body. It includes the cardiovascular system, or vascular system, that consists of the heart a ...

PHS for

and characterizing the genetic architecture of

. The

ALS Association The ALS Association is an American nonprofit organization that funds global amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) research, provides care services and programs to people affected by ALS through its nationwide network of clinical care centers, and w ...

featured his unique story and groundbreaking work in a 2018 article.

's Bostonia magazine featured Desikan in a 2018 article. Desikan's story was also featured as a cover story on

American Broadcasting Company The American Broadcasting Company (ABC) is an American Commercial broadcasting, commercial broadcast Television broadcaster, television and radio Radio network, network that serves as the flagship property of the Disney Entertainment division ...

's ''

Good Morning America ''Good Morning America'', often abbreviated as ''GMA'', is an American breakfast television, morning television program that is broadcast on American Broadcasting Company, ABC. It debuted on November 3, 1975, and first expanded to weekends wit ...

'' on Friday, November 23, 2018. He died on July 14, 2019, two and a half years after being diagnosed with a rapidly-progressive form of ALS.

Music

Desikan was an amateur musician and DJ. Even after the ALS diagnosis, Desikan created and recorded mixes, mainly using Native Instrument's

Traktor Traktor is DJ software developed by Native Instruments. It is also used as a sub-brand for Native Instruments' associated DJ hardware products. History Traktor was first released in 2000. The initial versions available were ''Traktor DJ'' ...

software, with a

motion capture Motion capture (sometimes referred as mocap or mo-cap, for short) is the process of recording high-resolution motion (physics), movement of objects or people into a computer system. It is used in Military science, military, entertainment, sports ...

system attached to himself. Desikan's mixes and live recordings are published on his

SoundCloud SoundCloud is a German audio streaming service owned and operated by SoundCloud Global Limited & Co. KG. The service enables its users to upload, promote, and share audio. Founded in 2007 by Alexander Ljung and Eric Wahlforss, SoundCloud is ...

page under the alias Rahul Quila.

Awards

*2011 Top Cited Article from 2006 to 2010, NeuroImage *2012 Cornelius G. Dyke Memorial Award *2016 Boerger Research Fund for Alzheimer’s Disease and Neurocognitive Disorders *2016–2017 Junior Investigator Award, National Alzheimer's Coordinating Center *2017 Outstanding Fellow / Clinical Instructor Teaching Award, UCSF Department of Radiology and Biomedical Imaging *2017–2019 Alzheimer's Neuroimaging Award, ASNR Foundation

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Desikan, Rahul 1978 births 2019 deaths American musicians of Indian descent American neuroscientists Deaths from motor neuron disease University of California, San Francisco faculty