Nicholas Smith

Dr. Nicholas Smith is the Director, Department of Neurology and Clinical Neurophysiology, The Women’s and Children’s Hospital, Adelaide, Australia and holds a conjoint appointment with the Discipline of Paediatric Medicine, University of Adelaide, where he leads the Paediatric Neurodegenerative Diseases Research Group. He was awarded a Churchill Fellowship to study disorders of neurotransmission at the Kennedy Krieger Institute, USA and completed a PhD within the Department of Medicine University of Cambridge, United Kingdom. He maintains a sub-speciality practice in neurogenetic and neurometabolic disease and paediatric movement disorders, with internationally recognised expertise in the Childhood Dementias, and a focus upon disorders of lysosomal metabolism. Dr. Smith maintains an active pre-clinical and translational research program, targeting the pathobiology of neurodegenerative disease, identification of disease biomarkers and novel therapeutic approaches, including gene transfer and antisense oligonucleotide technologies; he is a Principal investigator on multiple international clinical trials involving novel gene transfer and biopharmaceutical therapies for Childhood Dementia. He maintains strong collaborations with scientific, patient advocacy and clinical colleagues, who collectively advocate for therapeutic and health service advances on behalf of children with Childhood Dementia and their families.