Michal Schwartz

Michal Schwartz (born 1 January 1950) is a professor of neuroimmunology at the Weizmann Institute of Science and incumbent of The Maurice and Ilse Katz Professorial Chair in Neuroimmunology. She discovered new roles for immune cells in repair and neurogenesis, coining the term "protective autoimmunity" and expanding the field of immunology in neuroscience. She has been the elected chair of the International Society of Neuroimmunology (ISNI) since 2016, and her book “Neuroimmunity: A New Science that will Revolutionize How We Keep Our Brains Healthy and Young” received an honorable mention for the 2016 PROSE Awards, Biomedicine & Neuroscience category.
Education and early career.
Schwartz gained her Bachelor of Science ("with distinction") in chemistry at Hebrew University of Jerusalem in 1972. She received her PhD in Immunology in 1977 at the Weizmann Institute of Science, where she would later spend the majority of her career. She also spent time at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, researching nerve regeneration. At the Weizmann Institute she progressed from senior scientist in the Department of Neurobiology to a full professor in 1998, then awarded the Maurice and Ilse Katz Professorial Chair in Neuroimmunology in 2016.
Research.
Schwartz's work in neuroimmunology has encompassed a wide range of pathologies in the central nervous system (CNS) including : injury, neurodegeneration, mental dysfunction, and aging. By researching the immune system and its interactions with the brain, Schwartz focuses on improving repair, regeneration and neuroplasticity in health and disease. She coined the term “protective autoimmunity’ and demonstrated the role of immune cells such as macrophages and T cells in spinal cord repair. She also identified specific brain areas for ‘cross talk’ between the CNS and the immune system. This cross talk is important for recruiting immune cells and maintaining a healthy brain, and her work outlines how disruption of this crosstalk can play a role in brain aging and neurodegenerative disease. She also showed this role in pregnancy and fetal brain development, where immune disruption in the mother can be linked to neurodevelopmental disorders in children. Another focus of her work has been on repurposing cancer immunotherapies such as PD-1 blockers to treat neurodegenerative disorders such as Alzheimer’s disease. She is a highly cited academic with over 300 publications, appearing in highly ranked journals ("Science, Nature medicine, Nature Neuroscience, Nature Cell Biology, Nature Rev. Neurology, Nature Rev. Neuroscience, Nature Rev. Immunology, Immunity, EMBO J., PlosMedicine, PNAS").