Join us in giving a warm Texas welcome to Kevin Kumar, MD, PhD, pediatric neurosurgeon and assistant professor of neurosurgery at Dell Med. Dr. Kumar specializes in the treatment of pediatric brain and spine tumors, vascular malformations, developmental anomalies, and epilepsy.
Dr. Kumar graduated cum laude with distinction in research from Cornell University and received his MD and PhD from Vanderbilt University’s National Institutes of Health–funded Medical Scientist Training Program. His dissertation focused on investigating neuronal manganese regulation in Parkinson’s and Huntington’s disease using high-throughput screening, induced pluripotent stem cells, and chemical biology approaches. He was a member of Aaron Bowman’s laboratory in the Vanderbilt Brain Institute.
Dr. Kumar completed his neurosurgery residency at Stanford University, where he served as chief resident. He completed an NIH NINDS R25-funded research fellowship in the laboratory of Marius Wernig in the Stanford Institute for Stem Cell Biology and Regenerative Medicine, where he developed a platform to replace microglia in the brain as a novel therapy for neurodevelopmental disorders. He completed his pediatric neurosurgery fellowship at Lucile Packard Children’s Hospital at Stanford.
At Dell Med, Dr. Kumar launched his research laboratory to develop novel cellular-based therapeutics for pediatric neurological disorders. He has published over 35 peer-reviewed scientific articles and given over 30 presentations at national and international meetings. He has received multiple awards, including the Donald O. Quest Medical Student Basic Science Award by the American Association of Neurological Surgeons, the Elaine Sanders-Bush Neuroscience Research Prize from the Vanderbilt Brain Institute, the John G. Coniglio Prize in Biochemistry from Vanderbilt University, the Edwin Boldrey Young Investigator Award from the San Francisco Neurological Society, the Philip L. Gildenberg Resident Award from the AANS, and the Resident Basic Science Research Award from Stanford University.
He is a member of the American Association of Neurological Surgeons, the Congress of Neurological Surgeons, the American Society for Stereotactic and Functional Neurosurgery, the North American Neuromodulation Society, and the Society for Neuroscience.
Welcome to Austin, Dr. Kumar!