Dr. Benitez is a physician-scientist studying the functional consequences of disease-causing and risk-associated variants in Alzheimer’s disease (AD), Parkinson’s disease (PD), frontotemporal dementia (FTD), and autosomal dominant adult-onset neuronal ceroid lipofuscinosis (ANCL). As part of his research, Dr. Benitez uses a combination of state-of-the-art approaches in human genetic discoveries (e.g., whole-exome sequencing and GWAS data), functional genomic analyses (e.g., single nuclei RNA-sequencing from AD and PD patients) with in vitro (e.g., patient-derived iPS-cells and primary cells) and in vivo (e.g., stereotactic delivery of Adeno-associated virus (AAV) or alpha-Synuclein preformed fibrils in AD or PD mouse models) experiments. Dr. Benitez’s research program is focused on unraveling the genetic and genomic defects underlying the autophagy-lysosomal dysfunction in Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s diseases and to translate this knowledge to potential therapeutic molecular targets.