Biography

Dr. Lipton received his undergraduate and doctoral degrees in psychology and behavioral neuroscience from the University of California, Berkeley, and the University of California, Los Angeles. Dr. Lipton focused on strategies for dopamine cell transplantation as a therapeutic for Parkinson’s disease and the consequences of prenatal drugs of abuse on dopamine system development at Rush University in Chicago. Then, at the University of Cincinnati in 2004, he established the Division of Neuropharmacology in the Department of Psychiatry. While there, he and his colleagues were awarded a Morris K. Udall Center of Excellence in Parkinson’s Disease Research which transferred to Michigan State University’s College of Human Medicine in 2009. At MSU he founded the Department of Translational Neuroscience which is now housed in MSU’s Grand Rapids Research Center. Under his continued leadership as professor and founding chair, the department has been awarded over $50 million in research support and is among the top research-intensive biomedical research units at MSU.

Most recently Dr. Lipton and his team proposed, developed, operationalized a saliva test for Covid-19 and he leads the MSU Early Detection Program for testing faculty, staff and students. He successfully lobbied for federal regulatory changes that allowed universities to test for Covid-19 outside of the strictures of CLIA. He has been an advocate for universities facilitating national preparedness for biomedical disasters through Op-Eds in The Wall Street Journal, the Washington Post and The Hill and multiple appearances MSNBC including the Rachel Maddow Show, NBC/Peacock Zerlina Show as well as NPR, and Fox News.

In 2024, Dr. Lipton was appointed associate dean for research analytics. In this new role within the Office of Research, he is empowering unit leaders to use data to predict and improve performance. 

• Lipton Lab
• Dr. Lipton's Pub Med publications

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Education

Institution	Field of Study	Degree	Year
University of California, Berkeley	Psychology	B.A.	1988
University of California, Los Angeles	Behavioral Neuroscience Program	M.A.	1989
University of California, Los Angeles	Behavioral Neuroscience Program	Ph.D.	1993

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Research Interests

Dr. Lipton’s laboratory works in collaboration with faculty from the MSU PD Research Team.  His laboratory supports initiatives on neural transplantation therapies, pharmacokinetic studies of investigational drugs, gene therapy, deep brain stimulation, and etiology of PD.  Dr. Lipton’s laboratory has also had a long research history examining the central nervous system changes produced by developmental exposure to drugs of abuse, including cocaine and ecstasy.

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Technical Expertise

• Primary and cell line neuronal culture
• ELISA
• LC/MS
• HPLC (electrochemical, fluorescence and ultraviolet)
• Western Blot
• Real Time RT-PCR
• Taqman Low Density Arrays
• Radiometric organ blood flow measures
• Direct tissue autoradiography/homogenate receptor binding
• Stereotaxic surgery

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