Ellen Mowry, M.D.

Dr. Mowry became interested in multiple sclerosis (MS) prior to beginning college and first performed MS research as an undergraduate biology major at Georgetown University. As a neurology resident at the University of Pennsylvania, she began her multiple sclerosis clinical research activities in conducting a study of visual dysfunction and quality of life in multiple sclerosis. During her fellowship at UCSF, Dr. Mowry evaluated prognostic factors in multiple sclerosis and examined health-related quality of life in multiple sclerosis, particularly as a marker of disease burden. She also earned a Master’s Degree in Clinical Research at UCSF. Dr. Mowry continued as a member of the faculty there before joining the Johns Hopkins Department of Neurology as an Assistant Professor in July, 2011; she received a joint appointment in Epidemiology in 2013. She was appointed as the inaugural Richard T. and Frances W. Johnson Professor in 2022.

Over the past several years, Dr. Mowry has worked primarily to perform epidemiologic investigations of multiple sclerosis (MS) risk and prognostic factors and has evaluated both genetic and environmental contributors. While she has had a major role in several such studies, her most significant work led to the identification of the association of vitamin D status with relapse and brain lesion risk in patients with MS (Annals of Neurology 2010, Annals of Neurology 2012, European Journal of Neurology 2015). She also conducted the first pilot study comparing gut bacterial populations in patients with MS and healthy individuals (Journal of Investigative Medicine 2014). She was recently funded to investigate the impact of vitamin D supplementation on the metabolomics profile in patients with MS compared to healthy controls. She enjoys designing and conducting clinical trials in MS and is the Principal Investigator of the Vitamin D to Ameliorate Multiple Sclerosis (VIDAMS) multicenter vitamin D trial (NCT01490502), which is sponsored by the National MS Society and a smaller multicenter pilot study investigating vitamin D pharmacokinetics in MS patients and healthy controls (NCT01667796). She is also the recipient of a Harry Weaver Award from the National MS Society, in which she is investigating the impact of intermittent calorie restriction in MS. Finally, as Director of the MS Experimental Therapeutics Program at Johns Hopkins, she assists colleagues with study design and helps oversee the conduct of MS clinical trials.