Thomas S. Kilduff is an American neuroscientist and the director of

SRI International SRI International (SRI) is an American nonprofit scientific research institute and organization headquartered in Menlo Park, California. The trustees of Stanford University established SRI in 1946 as a center of innovation to support economic d ...

's Center for Neuroscience. He specializes in neurobiology related to sleep and wakefulness, and was involved in the discovery of

hypocretin Orexin (), also known as hypocretin, is a neuropeptide that regulates arousal, wakefulness, and appetite. The most common form of narcolepsy, type 1, in which the individual experiences brief losses of muscle tone ("drop attacks" or cataplexy), ...

(also known as orexin), a

neuropeptide Neuropeptides are chemical messengers made up of small chains of amino acids that are synthesized and released by neurons. Neuropeptides typically bind to G protein-coupled receptors (GPCRs) to modulate neural activity and other tissues like the ...

system that is highly involved in wakefulness regulation. His group at SRI International also discovered an unusual neuronal population in the cerebral cortex that is activated during sleep. He is also a consulting professor at the

Stanford University School of Medicine Stanford University School of Medicine is the medical school of Stanford University and is located in Stanford, California. It traces its roots to the Medical Department of the University of the Pacific, founded in San Francisco in 1858. This ...

's Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences.

Education

Kilduff obtained a B.S. from the

University of Florida The University of Florida (Florida or UF) is a public land-grant research university in Gainesville, Florida. It is a senior member of the State University System of Florida, traces its origins to 1853, and has operated continuously on its ...

and earned an M.S. and a Ph.D. in biological sciences from

Stanford University Stanford University, officially Leland Stanford Junior University, is a private research university in Stanford, California. The campus occupies , among the largest in the United States, and enrolls over 17,000 students. Stanford is consider ...

, where he was also awarded fellowships from the

Danforth Foundation The Danforth Foundation was one of the largest private nonprofit foundations in the St. Louis Metropolitan region. It closed its doors in 2011 after 84 years of operation and more than a billion dollars in grants distributed. Background Establishe ...

, the Grass Foundation, and the

National Science Foundation The National Science Foundation (NSF) is an independent agency of the United States government that supports fundamental research and education in all the non-medical fields of science and engineering. Its medical counterpart is the National I ...

Career

Kilduff was a senior research scientist at Stanford University's Center for Sleep and Circadian Neurobiology. He was also a visiting scientist in the

Scripps Research Institute Scripps Research, previously known as The Scripps Research Institute (TSRI), is a nonprofit American medical research facility that focuses on research and education in the biomedical sciences. Headquartered in San Diego, California, the institu ...

's Department of Molecular Biology, a visiting professor at the

University of Perugia University of Perugia (Italian ''Università degli Studi di Perugia'') is a public-owned university based in Perugia, Italy. It was founded in 1308, as attested by the Bull issued by Pope Clement V certifying the birth of the Studium Generale. Th ...

's Istituto di Biologia Cellulare, and a

National Academy of Sciences The National Academy of Sciences (NAS) is a United States nonprofit, non-governmental organization. NAS is part of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, along with the National Academy of Engineering (NAE) and the Nati ...

National Research Council National Research Council may refer to: * National Research Council (Canada), sponsoring research and development * National Research Council (Italy), scientific and technological research, Rome * National Research Council (United States), part of ...

research associate at NASA's

Ames Research Center The Ames Research Center (ARC), also known as NASA Ames, is a major NASA research center at Moffett Federal Airfield in California's Silicon Valley. It was founded in 1939 as the second National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics (NACA) laborat ...

. In 1999, Kilduff joined SRI International as part of a new molecular neurobiology group, where he subsequently founded the Sleep Neurobiology Program before becoming director of the Center for Neuroscience.

Research

Kilduff's early research focused on the neural control of mammalian hibernation and circadian rhythms. Kilduff and scientists at the Scripps Research Institute co-discovered

(also known as orexin), a

system that is involved in the control of wakefulness. Subsequent research established that the hypocretin neurons degenerate in the sleep disorder

narcolepsy Narcolepsy is a long-term neurological disorder that involves a decreased ability to regulate sleep–wake cycles. Symptoms often include periods of excessive daytime sleepiness and brief involuntary sleep episodes. About 70% of those affec ...

and is the likely cause of this disorder.

Awards and memberships

He was named a Fellow Member of the

American Association for the Advancement of Science The American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) is an American international non-profit organization with the stated goals of promoting cooperation among scientists, defending scientific freedom, encouraging scientific respons ...

in the December 18, 2009 issue of ''

Science Science is a systematic endeavor that builds and organizes knowledge in the form of testable explanations and predictions about the universe. Science may be as old as the human species, and some of the earliest archeological evidence for ...

''. He was named an SRI Fellow in 2010 and a Distinguished Scientist by the SRS in 2017. He is a member of the Society for Neuroscience has served on the boards of the

Associated Professional Sleep Societies Associated may refer to: *Associated, former name of Avon, Contra Costa County, California * Associated Hebrew Schools of Toronto, a school in Canada *Associated Newspapers, former name of DMG Media, a British publishing company See also *Associati ...

, the

Sleep Research Society The Sleep Research Society (SRS) is an organization that promotes the science of sleep and related disorders. Additionally, the SRS is dedicated to the training and education of future sleep researchers. Organization The organization traces its ...

, and was a Founding Member of the Sleep Research Society Foundation.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Kilduff, Thomas S Living people University of Florida alumni Stanford University alumni SRI International people Place of birth missing (living people) Fellows of the American Association for the Advancement of Science American neurologists Sleep researchers Scientists from the San Francisco Bay Area Year of birth missing (living people)