Dr. Mostofsky received his MD in 1990 through the Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute-Albany Medical College Six Year Program, where he won the Jack Spitalny Prize for exceptional achievement in Pediatrics. He went on to an internship and residencies in pediatrics and pediatric neurology at the University of Minnesota. Dr. Mostofsky first came to KKI in 1995 for a fellowship in the Department of Developmental Cognitive Neurology, and stayed on as a pediatric neurologist, with subspecialty training and experience in behavioral neurology as it applies to the study of childhood developmental disorders. Dr. Mostofsky is the Director of Kennedy Krieger Institute’s Laboratory for Neurocognitive and Imaging Research (LNIR), which focuses on understanding the neurological basis of developmental disorders, including autism and Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD).

Dr. Mostofsky’s clinical practice focuses on serving children in the autism spectrum and he serves as the Medical Director of the Center for Autism and Related Disorders at Kennedy Krieger Institute. He is a member of the American Academy of Neurology, the Child Neurology Society, the International Neuropsychological Society, the Society for Cognitive Neuroscience, the Society for Behavioral and Cognitive Neurology, and the Organization for Human Brain Mapping.

In Laboratory for Neurocognitive and Imaging Research (LNIR), Dr. Mostofsky investigates the biological basis of developmental disorders using both structural and functional imaging techniques and experimental neurobehavioral paradigms, including motor/oculomotor and cognitive testing. These methods are used to improve our understanding of the neurologic basis of autism and ADHD. This work has been supported by grants from theNIH (NINDS and NIMH) and the Autism Speaks Foundation.

Dr. Mostofsky’s research with children with autism is focused on careful examination of the motor function, as increased insight into the brain mechanisms underlying the disorder might be gained from careful consideration of the motor signs associated with autism. Dr. Mostofsky has made important contributions to identifying the common factors underlying motor impairments in autism and has begun to understand how anomalous patterns of motor learning in autism may contribute to the impaired social and communicative deficits that define the disorder.

Dr. Mostofsky is also working to pinpoint the neural systems affected in ADHD and to help identify mechanisms for effective therapeutic intervention. This investigative work has led to important insights into how impairments in response selection and control (of behavior ranging from basic motor execution to higher level cognition) contribute to the excessive impulsive, hyperactive, and off-task (“distractible”) behavior.

• Haswell C, Izawa J, Dowell L, Mostofsky SH, Shadmehr R. (2009). "Representation of internal models of action in the autistic brain." Nature Neuroscience; 12(9), 970-972.
• Mostofsky SH, Powell SK, Simmonds DJ, Goldberg MC, Caffo B, Pekar JJ. (2009). "Decreased connectivity and cerebellar activity in autism during motor task performance." Brain 132(pt 9), 2413-2425.
• Vaurio RG, Simmonds DJ, Mostofsky SH. (2009). "Increased intra-individual reaction time variability in Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder across response inhibition tasks with different cognitive demands." Neuropsychologia 47(17), 2389-2396.
• Qiu A, Crocetti D, Adler M, Mahone EM, Denckla MB, Miller MI, Mostofsky SH. (2009). "Basal ganglia volume and shape in children with ADHD." American Journal of Psychiatry 166(1), 74-82.
• Suskauer SJ, Simmonds DJ, Caffo BS, Denckla MB, Pekar JJ, Mostofsky SH. (2008). "fMRI of intrasubject variability in ADHD: Anomalous premotor activity with prefrontal compensation." Journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry. [Epub ahead of print]
• Mostofsky SH, Burgess MP, Gidley Larson JC. (2007). "Increased motor cortex white matter volume predicts motor impairment in autism." Brain 130(pt 8), 2117-22.

Stewart H. Mostofsky, MD

Pediatric Neurologist,
Director of the Laboratory of Neurocognitive and Imaging Research
Kennedy Krieger Institute
716 North Broadway, Baltimore MD 21205
(map & directions)

Telephone: (443) 923-9254
Email: mostofsky@kennedykrieger.org

Associate Professor of Neurology and Psychiatry,
Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine