Conrad Weihl

Conrad “Chris” Weihl is a Professor of Neurology, Head of the Neuromuscular Section and Director of the Muscular Dystrophy Association Clinic at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, Missouri, USA.  He received his undergraduate degree from the University of Illinois at Urbana/Champaign and his graduate (PhD) and medical (MD) degrees from the University of Chicago, where he trained in Neuroscience in the laboratory of Dr. Raymond Roos where he studied the role of presenilin-1 in familial Alzheimer’s disease. Dr. Weihl completed his residency in Neurology at Washington University and then pursued a Neuromuscular Fellowship at Washington University with Dr. Alan Pestronk.  Upon seeing a patient with dementia and inclusion body myopathy in clinic with Dr. Pestronk, he was sparked by the connections between neurodegenerative diseases and muscle diseases.  This led him to pursue a postdoctoral fellowship with Dr. Phyllis Hanson at Washington University in the Department of Cell Biology where he generated the first mouse model of hereditary inclusion body myopathy associated with mutations in VCP.  Dr. Weihl began his faculty appointment at Washington University in the Department of Neurology in 2007 and was promoted to full professor in 2018.  He was appointed Chief of the Neuromuscular Division in 2022. His research program focuses on both genetic and acquired myopathies with an emphasis on how dysfunction in protein quality controls lead to muscle degeneration.  More specifically, his work delineated the molecular mechanism of VCP associated inclusion body myopathy, identified the genetic cause of LGMDD1 and the role of TDP-43 aggregation in inclusion body myositis.  He has received a number of honors including the Derek Denny-Brown Young Neurological Scholar Award from the American Neurological Association and Daniel and Jephta Drachman family award from Johns Hopkins University.  He is currently the editor in chief of the journal Neuromuscular Disorders (NMD).  He is an active member ClinGen Neuromuscular Working Group and Chair of the ClinGen LGMD gene and variant curation expert panels.  Dr. Weihl has a strong commitment to the training of future neuromuscular clinicians and myologists.  He was awarded a K24 mid-career investigator award to mentor residents, fellows, junior faculty and early stage scientists in patient oriented research. Clinically, Dr. Weihl sees patients in a multidisciplinary muscular dystrophy association clinic and recently established a clinic devoted to the care of patients with IBM.