Academy Fellow

Prof Piguet is a clinician/researcher who investigates frontotemporal dementia (FTD) and related younger-onset dementias. His innovative research program combines cognition, behaviour, social cognition, neuroimaging, biomarkers and postmortem investigations. This approach has led to important contributions to the understanding of these rare but fatal brain disorders. Worldwide, Prof Piguet is ranked 2nd out of 16,890 for his expertise on FTD and 24 out of 234,000 for his expertise on dementia (www.expertscape.com). He has published >330 peer-reviewed papers (>25.5K citations). Publications relevant to this application span social cognition (49 pubs), disease progression (38 pubs), mechanisms of dementia (36 pubs), language (45 pubs) and neuroimaging (53 pubs) in FTD. His research program contributed to the revision of the diagnostic criteria for behavioural-variant FTD (Rascovsky et al. Brain 2011), which have led to the harmonisation of the disease around the world (>5000 cites).

Among his many projects, his research has identified: (i) the metabolic changes; (ii) profiles of social dysfunctions; and (iii) their biological bases correlates in FTD. Knowledge impact of this work is reflected by recent invited review articles (e.g., Grossman et al. Nat Rev Dis Prim 2023; Piguet & Kumfor Curr Opin Neurol 2020). In addition, his program has developed 11 clinical tests for dementia, many translated in different languages. These tests are freely available (www.frontierftd.org) His successful intervention methods targeting behaviour and language have shown to improve quality of life and independence in patients and their families, reducing burden of care.

Prof Piguet’s contributions are recognised internationally. He has established >20 inter/national collaborations across three continents (Argentina, USA, Canada, UK, Europe). His expertise and influence in the field has contributed to the creation of several consortia (e.g., International FTD Genomics Consortium; Neuropsychiatric International Consortium – FTD) and he is sitting on several advisory bodies (Australian FTD Association; Medical Advisory Council of the Association for FTD, USA; INECO, Argentina; IMPACT, Peru/UK). He was elected President-Elect of the International Society for FTD in 2023, starting his two-year term as President on 1 January 2025.

Professor of Clinical Neuropsychology, School of Psychology, the University of Sydney

Director, FRONTIER, Frontotemporal Dementia Clinical Research Group; Brain & Mind Centre, the University of Sydney

Board Director, Australian Frontotemporal Dementia Association

Medical Advisory Council, The Association for Frontotemporal Degeneration, USA

President – International Society for Frontotemporal Dementias (2025-2027)

NHMRC Leadership Fellow (Level 2)(2022-2026)

Member of the Australian Psychological Society 

Fellow of the College of Clinical Neuropsychology of the Australian Psychological Society (2017)

Doctorate Honoris Causa; Favaloro University, Argentina; for contributions to the field of clinical neurosciences (2015)

H Tasman Lovell Memorial Medallion for best PhD in Psychology, the University of Sydney (2001)

1. Landin-Romero R, Kumfor F, Lee AYS, Leyton C, Piguet O. (2024). Clinical and cortical trajectories in non-fluent primary progressive aphasia and Alzheimer’s disease: A role for emotion processing. Brain Research. 2024 Jan 28:1829:148777. doi: 10.1016/j.brainres.2024.148777.

2. Grossman M, Seeley W, W, Boxer A, L, Hillis A, E, Knopman D, S, Ljubenov P, A, Miller B, Piguet O, Rademakers R, Whitwell J, L, Zetterberg H, van Swieten J, C. (2023). Frontotemporal lobar degeneration. Nat Rev Dis Primers. 2023 Aug 10;9(1):40. doi: 10.1038/s41572-023-00447-0.

3. Ahmed RM, Tse NY, Chen Y, Henning E, Hodges JR, Kiernan M, Irish M, Farooqi IS & Piguet O. (2021). Neural correlates of fat preference in frontotemporal dementia: translating insights from the obesity literature. Annals of Clinical and Translational Neurology. 8(6): 1318–1329. doi: 10.1002/acn3.51369.

4. Chen Y, Landin-Romero R, Kumfor F, Irish M, Hodges JR, Piguet O. (2020). Cerebellar structural connectivity and contributions to cognition in frontotemporal dementias. Cortex. 129:57-67. doi: 10.1016/j.cortex.2020.04.013. 

5. Kumfor F, Hazelton JL, Rushby JA, Hodges JR, Piguet O. (2019). Facial expressiveness and physiological arousal in frontotemporal dementia: Phenotypic clinical profiles and neural correlates. Cogn Affect Behav Neurosci. Feb,19(1):197-210. doi:10.3758/s13415-018-00658-z.