Alison Baird

Alison Baird, MB, BS, PhD, MPH, is a Professor of Neurology and Physiology/Pharmacology at SUNY Downstate Medical Center and serves as the Vice-Chair for Career Development and Mentoring in the Department of Neurology. She is an active clinician and researcher with an NIH-funded program focused on stroke diagnosis, therapeutics, and point-of-care technologies. Previously, she held leadership roles including Director of the Stroke Program, Director of the Division of Cerebrovascular Disease and Stroke, and Program Director for the ACGME-accredited Vascular Neurology Fellowship at Downstate.

Education: Undergraduate and Medical degrees (MB, BS) from the University of Melbourne, Australia; PhD in Physiology/Pharmacology and MPH from Harvard University. Post-doctoral training at Harvard Medical School and Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center.

Research Interests: Dr. Baird’s work emphasizes novel diagnostics and therapies for stroke, leveraging genomics, immunology, and biomarker discovery. Her contributions include pioneering studies on blood-based biomarkers, endothelial microparticles, and transcriptional profiling in stroke pathophysiology. Her research has influenced contemporary stroke treatment protocols and clinical trial design.

Publications: Over 150 peer-reviewed articles, including landmark papers on stroke genomics, immune mechanisms, and imaging diagnostics. Her work has been highly cited and recognized internationally.

Awards: Recipient of prestigious awards for her contributions to stroke research and clinical practice, though specific names are not detailed here. Her leadership in mentoring has established a nationally accredited vascular neurology fellowship program.

Labs/Teams: Active in the Stroke Center at Downstate, collaborating with multidisciplinary teams in translational research and clinical care. Her NIH-funded projects focus on advancing precision medicine approaches to stroke management.