Hiroaki Sekiya, MD, PhD

Dr. Hiroaki Sekiya is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Neuroscience at Mayo Clinic in Jacksonville, Florida. He earned his MD from Kobe University School of Medicine and PhD from Kobe University Graduate School of Medicine, where he investigated α-synuclein propagation and oligomers in synucleinopathies. After serving as Assistant Professor in the Department of Neurology at Kobe University, he joined Mayo Clinic in 2021. Dr. Sekiya specializes in neuropathology of neurodegenerative diseases, with particular expertise in α-synuclein oligomer visualization using proximity ligation assay. His research demonstrated widespread α-synuclein oligomers in multiple system atrophy and Parkinson's disease, revealed their distribution in LRRK2-related Parkinson's disease regardless of Lewy pathology status, and showed that hippocampal α-synuclein oligomers influence cognitive decline progression in dementia with Lewy bodies. His work integrates clinical neurology background with advanced neuropathological techniques to elucidate clinicopathological correlations in synucleinopathies..