Michele Hu, PhD

Michele Hu is a Professor at the Nuffield Department of Clinical Neurosciences, University of Oxford and Honorary Consultant Neurologist at Oxford University Hospitals. After obtaining her medical degree from the University of London in 1993, Michele’s interest in Parkinson’s disease started in 1998 when she was awarded an Action Research Training Fellowship to study brain function in Parkinson’s disease patients using MRI and PET brain imaging techniques. In 2001 she was awarded her PhD based on this work, and went on to train in Parkinson’s disease and movement disorders at the National Hospital for Neurology and Neurosurgery, Royal Free Hospital and Oxford University Hospitals.

Since commencing her NHS consultant appointment in 2005, Michele has led the medical Parkinson’s disease and movement disorders service, setting up one of only seven nationally-accredited atypical PD clinics (MSA, CBD and PSP) at Oxford University Hospitals NHS Trust, in addition to managing a caseload of more than 600 Parkinson’s patients. She is a member of the National Institute for Health Research (NIHR) Neurodegeneration Speciality Group, and is the NIHR Parkinson’s Speciality Lead for the Thames Valley and South Midlands region. Since 2015, she has chaired the Research Engagement Committee of the UK Parkinson’s Excellence Network, and is a member of the Parkinson’s UK Cohort Studies Council and Treasurer of the Association of British Neurologists Movement Disorders Special Interest Group (ABN-MDSIG).

Michele is co-Principle Investigator with Professor Richard Wade-Martins of the Oxford Parkinson’s Disease Centre, and leads the Clinical Theme of this £10.7 million Monument Discovery 10 year award funded by Parkinson’s UK to understand the earliest pathological pathways in PD. In 2013, she moved to a Senior Clinical Research Fellow, and subsequently Associate Professor Post at the Nuffield Department of Clinical Neurosciences, University of Oxford in 2015, before being awarded her Professorship in August 2019. Her current academic funding facilitates translational research in the field of longitudinal cohort studies and biomarkers for early and prodromal Parkinson’s disease, with particular focus on REM sleep behavior disorder and how sleep affects neurodegeneration.