Lorraine Iacovitti, PhD, earned her PhD in neurobiology and behavior from Cornell University Medical College in New York City and completed her postdoctoral training at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis. She is currently a professor in the Department of Neuroscience at Thomas Jefferson University and director of the Jefferson Stem Cell and Regenerative Neuroscience Center. Dr. Iacovitti is also research director for the Jefferson Comprehensive Parkinson's Disease and Movement Disorder Center. In 2007, she was honored with the Tilker Foundation's inaugural Outstanding Investigator Award in Stem Cell Research, and in 2017 she received Jefferson's Research Career Achievement Award. Dr. Iacovitti studies how stem cells mature into fully formed dopamine-producing nerve cells of the midbrain (the cells lost in Parkinson's disease (PD)). She uses these mature stem cells for disease modeling and discovery of drugs, particularly, of neuroprotective agents, in vitro. Her goal is to translate these discoveries into new therapies for Parkinson's disease.