Dr. Laura Adang MD PhD MSTR is an Assistant Professor of Child Neurology at the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia specializing in the care of children with leukodystrophies. Dr. Adang is a magna cum laude graduate of the University of Georgia’s Foundation Fellowship scholarship program and a graduate of the Medical Scientist Training Program at the University of Virginia, where she received both her M.D. and Ph.D. Her graduate work characterized the immune evasion mechanisms of herpesvirus infections. She completed her pediatrics and child neurology residencies, fellowship training in multiple sclerosis, and a masters of translational research at the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia and the University of Pennsylvania. She is also course director of the Predoctoral Preparatory Program at the Institute for Translational Medicine and Therapeutics (ITMAT) program at the Perelman School of Medicine of the University of Pennsylvania.
As part of the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia’s Leukodystrophy Center of Excellence, her focus is the care of children with white matter disorders, including Aicardi Goutières Syndrome (AGS). AGS is a heritable inflammatory disorder which mimics viral infection. Her work is focused on defining early disease manifestations to predict clinical trajectories, develop outcomes assessments to measure clinical changes that are meaningful to families, and to evaluate new therapeutic options. Her work is funded through both the NIH and family foundation grants.