Dr. Leonidas Stefanis obtained his MD and PhD in molecular medicine at the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens (NKUA). He trained as a neurologist and neurobiologist at Columbia University in New York. He returned to Greece in 2003 as a clinician/scientist at the Medical School in NKUA and as a researcher in the Biomedical Research Foundation of the Academy of Athens (BRFAA), where he established a laboratory studying neurodegenerative diseases. He investigates various areas of Parkinson’s disease pathogenesis, ranging from the bench to the bedside. He is examining the genetic underpinnings of the disease, mainly in the rare familial cases of genetic synucleinopathies, disease biomarkers and, using cellular and animal models, the inter-related pathways of alpha-synuclein aggregation and associated neurotoxicity, with an emphasis on the involvement of protein degradation pathways, such as Chaperone-Mediated Autophagy.