Vicky Johnson: mind researcher who studied the hyperlinks between traumatic mind harm and neurodegenerative illness

Till her premature dying aged 44, Scottish born Vicky Johnson, affiliate professor of neurosurgery at Perelman Faculty of Drugs, College of Pennsylvania, led landmark worldwide analysis exploring the biology and pathology of traumatic mind harm (TBI), with initiatives spanning advanced pre-clinical fashions to human pathology research. She established herself as one of many leaders in TBI analysis, directing a number of programmes and mentoring many college students and postdoctoral researchers.

“Traumatic mind harm is a typical and sometimes devastating well being drawback,” she mentioned on the Johnson Laboratory web site, highlighting the way it affected 2.5 million individuals a yr within the US.1 Johnson’s analysis targeted largely on hyperlinks between TBI and neurodegenerative ailments similar to Alzheimer’s and power traumatic encephalopathy, together with the brief and long run outcomes of sports activities concussions. Her work superior understanding of the mechanisms by which acute mind trauma results in long run neurological decline. She contributed to greater than 120 revealed analysis articles and garnered a number of analysis awards.

Vicky Johnson was born in Stirling, Scotland, in August 1981 to Eleanor, a social housing supervisor, and Frederick Johnson, an engineer and subsequently supervisor within the telecommunications sector. She grew up along with her older brother Scott and attended Balmalloch Main Faculty and Kilsyth Academy, the place she was a preferred and industrious scholar.

In 1999 she was admitted to the College of …