Sonya Dumanis, PhD

• Communications
• Grants administration

Sonya is the Deputy Director of Aligning Science Across Parkinson’s.

Previously, Sonya was the Vice President of Research and Innovation at the Epilepsy Foundation. While there, she oversaw the growth of the Epilepsy Therapy Project, an entrepreneurship incubator providing seed funding and mentorship to epilepsy startups, launched the Epilepsy Innovation Institute, an innovation incubator tackling high risk projects in the epilepsy space, and supported early career research development through the Next Generation Programs. Sonya has been with the Epilepsy Foundation since 2016. Prior to joining the Epilepsy Foundation, she worked at the Milken Institute Center for Strategic Philanthropy, tasked with identifying key philanthropic opportunities poised to have a transformative impact on the state of research and developing research programs.

Sonya completed her postdoctoral training at both the Johns Hopkins University and the Max-Delbrück Center in Berlin, Germany. She earned her PhD in neuroscience from Georgetown University. She has authored numerous scientific articles and received a number of honors, including an Alexander von Humboldt Postdoctoral Research Fellowship, a National Science Foundation fellowship, a national research service award from the National Institutes of Health, the Harold N Glassman Award for best science dissertation at Georgetown University, and the Mark A. Smith prize from the Journal of Neurochemistry. Sonya has demonstrated a strong commitment to science outreach, developing several educational initiatives such as the Georgetown Medical Center Graduate Student Research Grants program and the Epilepsy Foundation / Danny Did startup accelerator course, as well as directing a Fundamentals of Neurobiology Course to Master’s students at Georgetown University.