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Michael Okun

@michaelokun.bsky.social
2.8K followers 60 following 6.3K posts

Author of the Parkinson’s Plan, Medical Advisor Parkinson Foundation, Author 15 books pdplan.org Distinguished Professor and Director of the Fixel, Associate Editor JAMA Neurology, co-founder @DBSThinkTank

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Michael Okun @michaelokun.bsky.social · 6h
What excites me is not that this drug is a game changer for everyone, but that we are finally expanding beyond traditional dopamine-based approaches.
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Michael Okun @michaelokun.bsky.social · 07/10/2026
Could going gluten-free help Parkinson’s disease? A provocative 12-month randomized study of 57 folks with Parkinson’s found it did not improve motor symptoms; it was associated w/ modestly better cognitive performance and improved quality of life, along w/ changes in lipid and metabolic profiles.
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Michael Okun @michaelokun.bsky.social · 06/10/2026
What resonates most with me about this work featured today in USA TODAY is how directly it connects two ideas I care deeply about: levodopa for all and food as medicine. usatodayspecial-va.newsmemory.com?special=Food...
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Michael Okun @michaelokun.bsky.social · 06/10/2026
Phase 2b LUMA trial that tested BIIB122/DNL151, an oral brain-penetrant inhibitor of LRRK2, as a potential disease-modifying therapy in 648 participants with early-stage Parkinson’s disease. Results just announced in Seoul this week. Unfortunately negative. www.mdscongress.org/Abstracts/La...
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Scientific American @sciam.bsky.social · 05/10/2026
Mathematicians saw a simple string hooking a painting onto two nails and thought, “We can make it worse.”
scientificamerican.com
Mathematicians discover the worst way to hang a painting
New solutions found to picture-hanging problems
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Michael Okun @michaelokun.bsky.social · 05/10/2026
The Phase 2b ACTIVATE trial tested whether BIA 28-6156, an oral activator of the GCase enzyme, could slow progression in Parkinson’s disease associated with GBA1 variants. Despite a compelling biological rationale, neither dose slowed clinical progression.
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Scientific American @sciam.bsky.social · 04/10/2026
The ancient pre-Roman society of Etruria in Italy embedded sound throughout its culture. Now, researchers are harnessing AI and acoustic technology to bring some of that sound to life.
scientificamerican.com
How AI helped bring an ancient tomb dating to before the Roman empire back to life
Pairing artificial intelligence with acoustic technology helped reveal an Erturian tomb in new light
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Michael Okun @michaelokun.bsky.social · 04/10/2026
What is the Best Diet for Parkinson’s Disease? My Parkinson’s Plate co-author and registered dietitian at the Fixel Institute at the University of Florida Emily Truscott, MS, RD, LD, breaks down what we know about nutrition and Parkinson’s; and what we don’t. youtu.be/Fsu87UTmOoU?... via @YouTube
youtu.be
What is the Best Diet for Parkinson’s Disease?
YouTube video by Michael Okun
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The Parkinson's Foundation @parkinsondotorg.bsky.social · 10/04/2026
We’re celebrating a major milestone for the Parkinson’s community! The National Parkinson’s Plan Advisory Council is officially appointed and ready to begin its work. The Advisory Council includes @michaelokun.bsky.social, National Medical Advisor to the Parkinson’s Foundation. (1/2)
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Suzanne 🕊️💞🇺🇸🇺🇦🗣️✍🏻🎶⚾️🏴‍☠️🟧♊️ @suzmatth.bsky.social · 17/04/2026
Here's the link: jamanetwork.com/journals/jam... "...participants listened to “Stayin’ Alive” ... This music selection was chosen because of its upbeat nature & it has a recorded tempo (103.6 bpm) that is within range of the average cadence for a person with mild- to moderate-stage PD."
jamanetwork.com
Regular Metronome, Fractal Metronome, and Music for Parkinson Gait
This case-control study examines the associations of 3 auditory cues vs no cue with gait measures among older adults with Parkinson disease and healthy controls.
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Stimulating Brains @stimulatingbrains.org · 22/05/2026
Is Parkinson's Disease a preventable disease? In their new book, @michaelokun.bsky.social & Ray Dorsey accumulate evidence for this notion and direct a plan to do so. Tune in here 👇👇 stimulatingbrains.org/80-michael-o... @fixelinstitute.bsky.social @parkinsondotorg.bsky.social
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Andreas Horn @andreashorn.org · 22/05/2026
Which role do environmental toxins play in the origin of Parkinson's Disease? Find out here 👇👇 – and in @michaelokun.bsky.social's new book, the Parkinson's Plan!
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TogetherForSharon® @togetherforsharon.bsky.social · 26/05/2026
Thank you @michaelokun for your work, friendship and support in this fight for policy for the community #wpc2026 #togetherforsharon @michaelokun.bsky.social
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Don Gilbert @gilbertpedneuro.bsky.social · 28/05/2026
If approved by FDA, ecopipam will become an important addition to our toolkit
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Cynthia Barnett @cynthiabarnett.bsky.social · 11/06/2026
The # of people w/ Parkinson's is exploding. Are chemicals to blame? Read "Poisoned Pathways" @ufjschool.bsky.social, now in @tampabaytimes.bsky.social. (& check out this 1950s photo of a UF dorm being doused w DDT.) @pulitzercenter.org @michaelokun.bsky.social www.tampabay.com/news/environ...
Earl Dixon sprays DDT on a UF dorm bed in the 1950s.
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Azra Bihorac @azrabihorac.com · 30/08/2026
Michael, thank you for this. Two thirds of women report cognitive change through the transition, and almost none of it has been studied as neurology. I wrote about my own third chapter last week; the body arrived there long before the literature did. Glad Bove and Dobson are drawing the map.
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Michael Okun @michaelokun.bsky.social · 04/10/2026
This late-breaking abstract from the Congress of Parkinson’s Disease and Movement Disorders in Seoul this weekend is exciting because PSP remains a devastating disease with no proven therapy that meaningfully slows its progression. Here in this data we have a signal that deserves serious attention.
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Michael Okun @michaelokun.bsky.social · 03/10/2026
Inspiring morning at UF with Nobel Laureate Thomas Südhof. One striking takeaway: the brain is constantly remodeling its connections with some synapses turning over on the order of ~10 days. A powerful reminder of the extraordinary plasticity of the human brain.
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Michael Okun @michaelokun.bsky.social · 02/10/2026
Mini-brains in a dish: why are Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s researchers are so excited? New review in Brain shows how rapidly these models are becoming more sophisticated and why they could change the way we study diseases like Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s.
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Michael Okun @michaelokun.bsky.social · 30/09/2026
Bravo on the recent reauthorization of ACT for ALS. This bill was critically important because federal programs were set to expire, threatening momentum in expanded access to investigational therapies and ALS research. Additionally, researchers have been using HEALEY to move promising drugs faster.
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Michael Okun @michaelokun.bsky.social · 29/09/2026
Although clinical trials suggest that some of the problems traditionally associated with dopamine agonists may occur less frequently with this more selective drug, as tavapadon moves into real-world use we need to remain vigilant for the full spectrum of dopamine agonist related effects.
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Michael Okun @michaelokun.bsky.social · 28/09/2026
I love sports and recognize everything they can give a child including fitness, teamwork, confidence and community; however I think we should be asking whether tackle football needs to begin so young? Consider there is plenty of time to learn how to tackle and only one developing brain to protect.
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Scientific American @sciam.bsky.social · 26/09/2026
Fermi Explorer—a plan to send a probe on an 80,000-year trip to Alpha Centauri—is meant to show the feasibility of interstellar voyages. The trouble is we’ve already been sending spacecraft to the stars for nearly 50 years. Is this new effort worthwhile?
scientificamerican.com
NASA has launched five interstellar missions. Should this private venture launch a sixth?
Fermi Explorer, a proposed low-cost private mission to Alpha Centauri, seeks to address a question that’s already been answered
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Scientific American @sciam.bsky.social · 27/09/2026
Mathematicians (amateur and professional) used AI to find all 25,000 cases of one “inverse Galois problem,” solving a decades-old conundrum.
scientificamerican.com
Mathematicians use AI to find mysterious symmetries, solving decades-old problem
In parallel, a race by amateurs and mathematicians has found all 25,000 cases of one “inverse Galois problem”
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Michael Okun @michaelokun.bsky.social · 27/09/2026
David Charles said something that blew me away. This is year 20 for our annual focus on common movement disorders course at Vanderbilt University. Almost every academic movement disorder program in the US features one or more of our graduates. That defines impact.
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Michael Okun @michaelokun.bsky.social · 26/09/2026
Negative trials matter, particularly in ALS. We need failures to get successes. Thomas Edison is credited with reframing his repeated attempts to build the light bulb as, “I have not failed. I've just found 10,000 ways that won't work.” That is how we should view well-designed negative trials.
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The Parkinson's Foundation @parkinsondotorg.bsky.social · 24/09/2026
Learn how to get involved with Parkinson's disease research! 🔬 Parkinson.org/library/fact-sheets/research
parkinson.org
Getting Involved in Research
Learn more about the Parkinson's disease research process and how to get involved.
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Scientific American @sciam.bsky.social · 24/09/2026
Apple "detectives" wanted to identify a gnarly old tree growing on a remote plot of land in Maine. What they discovered was the key to a centuries-old apple mystery.
scientificamerican.com
How apple detectives solved the mystery of an ancient tree—and rewrote the history of fruit
And how they might have helped save the future of American apples
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Scientific American @sciam.bsky.social · 25/09/2026
Can a six-dimensional sphere be described using imaginary numbers? For decades, experts puzzled over this question. Now an AI has apparently answered it.
scientificamerican.com
AI solves 79-year-old math mystery of six-dimensional spheres
Can a six-dimensional sphere be described using imaginary numbers? For decades, experts puzzled over this question. Now an AI has apparently answered it
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Michael Okun @michaelokun.bsky.social · 25/09/2026
We need cleaner air and better research, but we should also be thinking about practical ways to reduce our individual exposures while the science continues to evolve. Do you have a HEPA air filter in your home, and do you wear a mask outside on polluted days?
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Michael Okun @michaelokun.bsky.social · 23/09/2026
This quick flip-through gives you a look inside a book designed to move beyond confusing dietary advice and toward practical choices you can actually use. youtube.com/shorts/Sk7uU...
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Michael Okun @michaelokun.bsky.social · 23/09/2026
My take on the negative ceperognastat trial for AD. I would not interpret this as evidence that tau is the wrong target; tau burden remains closely linked to neurodegeneration and clinical decline, and several next-generation tau approaches remain under study.
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Michael Okun @michaelokun.bsky.social · 22/09/2026
What resonates most with me about Carey Gillam’s deeply reported piece is not simply the continuing concern about paraquat and Parkinson’s disease, but the question of whether our regulatory system has been working with the full deck of cards. www.thenewlede.org/2026/09/syng...
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Michael Okun @michaelokun.bsky.social · 22/09/2026
Could the human brain begin as two different developmental programs? And what could this mean for Parkinson’s, Alzheimer’s and ALS? Neural ectoderm progenitors are very early cells that ultimately give rise to the brain. nature.com/articles/s41...
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Michael Okun @michaelokun.bsky.social · 21/09/2026
Can we trust AI chatbots for PD information? Generative AI chatbots use artificial intelligence to create conversational answers to questions, but in health care a convincing answer is not necessarily a correct or safe answer. Meet AI chatbot called jAImes. www.thelancet.com/journals/lan...
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Michael Okun @michaelokun.bsky.social · 20/09/2026
Team Fox Detroit gala celebrated 10 years last night and an honor to unbox and give away the first 300 Parkinson's Plate books. Team Fox is creating impact and has raised 1.6 million dollars for PD research! Donna and Mike are knocking Parkinson's out of the park. us.amazon.com/Parkinsons-P...
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Scientific American @sciam.bsky.social · 17/09/2026
Check out the first new species of wild cat discovered in more than a century. The even better news: it’s adorable.
scientificamerican.com
See the first new species of cat discovered in more than a century—it’s adorable
The cat is smaller than a house cat but has the spots of a leopard
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Scientific American @sciam.bsky.social · 18/09/2026
What is the next number in this sequence: 1, 2, 4, 8, 16 ... ? The answer may surprise you and it has to do with Moser's circle problem.
scientificamerican.com
How pizza can solve this unusual math puzzle
Moser’s circle problem can be used to divide a pizza into one, two, four, eight, 16 or 31 slices. It’s a perfect example of how the numbers in a sequence aren’t as clear-cut as they may first appear
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Lead-DBS @lead-dbs.org · 19/09/2026
New publication using Lead-DBS: In this article by Hanafi et al., the authors tested gait-adaptation kinematics, EEG, and FDG‑PET in Parkinson's patients during virtual obstacle avoidance with active versus paused STN‑DBS and... Check out the paper here 👇👇 doi.org/10.1016/j.brs.2026.103207
Title card for publication: Subthalamic DBS Engages Right-lateralized Frontal Control to Improve Gait Adaptation in Parkinson’s Disease
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Michael Okun @michaelokun.bsky.social · 18/09/2026
What resonated with me from the final session of DBS Think Tank XIV on digital health-guided neuromodulation was how rapidly digital tools are beginning to connect the entire therapeutic journey, from predicting and planning to programming and long-term monitoring.
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Michael Okun @michaelokun.bsky.social · 18/09/2026
What resonated with me from this morning’s DBS Think Tank session on advanced imaging in neuromodulation was how imaging is rapidly evolving from a picture of anatomy into a roadmap of the circuits we want to understand and modulate.
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Michael Okun @michaelokun.bsky.social · 18/09/2026
One of my favorite moments from this morning’s DBS Think Tank came from Nico Dosenbach, who reminded us of the famous story of Charles Steinmetz and Henry Ford. The chalk marked “X” on exactly the right spot; and told the engineers where to make the repair. Check out the invoice.
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Michael Okun @michaelokun.bsky.social · 17/09/2026
“Deep brain stimulation” can sound frightening; “brain pacemaker” is simpler, more familiar and may better communicate what we are actually trying to do: use an implanted device to help restore function and improve lives.
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Michael Okun @michaelokun.bsky.social · 17/09/2026
What resonated with me from today’s DBS Think Tank session on electrophysiology-guided neuromodulation was how rapidly we are moving from simply recording brain signals to understanding which physiology actually matters and then using it to guide therapy.
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Michael Okun @michaelokun.bsky.social · 17/09/2026
Industry continues to blaze new paths, but the magic happens when engineers and innovators work shoulder-to-shoulder with academicians and clinicians to ask the difficult questions, perform the rigorous studies and generate the evidence necessary to push the horizon. Great DBS Think Tank session.
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Michael Okun @michaelokun.bsky.social · 17/09/2026
What resonated with me most from this morning’s DBS Think Tank session on sEEG-guided neuromodulation was the sense that we are moving beyond simply asking where to stimulate and toward understanding the circuits, signals and physiology that can tell us how to stimulate better.
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Michael Okun @michaelokun.bsky.social · 16/09/2026
What resonated with me from today’s DBS Think Tank session on neuromodulation of mood and cognition was how quickly we are moving from simply observing these remarkably complex human circuits to recording, understanding and potentially modulating them in the real world.
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Michael Okun @michaelokun.bsky.social · 16/09/2026
What resonated with me from our first session of the DBS Think Tank was the remarkable promise, and also the complexity, of neuromodulating the cerebellum. We are learning that the cerebellum is far more than a motor structure; its circuits reach into movement, cognition, emotion and behavior.
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Michael Okun @michaelokun.bsky.social · 16/09/2026
Today we begin the next conversation. DBS Think Tank XIV is officially underway. Open to everyone and especially persons w/ disease. View the agenda & register: fixel.ufhealth.org/think-tanks/...
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Scientific American @sciam.bsky.social · 15/09/2026
The Denisovans are considered one of modern humans’ closest ancient ancestors, yet we know very little about how they looked or lived. A new analysis gives tantalizing clues, suggesting they may have looked more like us than we thought.
scientificamerican.com
Scientists unlock new clues to what a mysterious ancient human ancestor looked like
An analysis of ancient bones found in a Chinese cave offer glimpses of how Denisovans lived more than 130,000 years ago
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