Angkustsiri Lab | UC Davis MIND Institute

Angkustsiri Lab

Our team studies the developmental and behavioral characteristics of various neurodevelopmental disabilities.

child playing on a playground

Our team studies the developmental and behavioral characteristics of various neurodevelopmental disabilities, including chromosome 22q11.2 deletion syndrome, Down syndrome, and autism.

For more information about the Angkustsiri Lab: kangkustsiri@ucdavis.edu or 916-703-0235

Angkustsiri Lab Staff

Kathleen Angkustsiri

Principal Investigator
Kathleen Angkustsiri is the principal investigator of the lab. She is a board certified Developmental Behavioral Pediatrician with expertise in neurodevelopmental disabilities including Down syndrome, 22q11.2 deletion syndrome (22q), autism, and fragile X syndrome. She received her B.A. from Stanford University and completed medical school at NYU School of Medicine. After pediatric residency training at Children’s Hospital and Research Center at Oakland, she came to UC Davis for fellowship training in Developmental-Behavioral Pediatrics. After joining the faculty in Pediatrics and the MIND Institute, she completed additional research training through the Mentored Clinical Research Training Program and was a KL2 scholar. She has over 10 years of experience with clinical trials in neurodevelopmental disabilities, such as autism, fragile X syndrome, and Down syndrome.

Danielle Ponzini

Clinical Research Coordinator
Danielle Ponzini is the coordinator for the Downs Syndrome and ADHD study at the MIND Institute. She received her Bachelors of Science in both Psychobiology and Cellular and Molecular Biology from UC Davis in 2005. In 2006, she started working as an Assistant Community Health Representative for an autism focused social and behavioral study at the MIND. She quickly moved into a coordinator position where she stayed with the study for 11 years. She left in 2017 to work at UCLA, in the Radiology department, coordinating for a hospital program focused on quality control and research in imaging for abdominal cancer. Two years later, she returned to UC Davis gaining experience working in clinical trials for Neurology. However, she is now happy to be back with her MIND family working on this clinical trial and Downs Syndrome.