Haluk Topaloğlu

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Haluk Aydın Topaloğlu (born May 5, 1953) is a Turkish pediatric neurologist and professor. He works as a Professor of Pediatrics and Neurology at Hacettepe University in Ankara and as a Professor of Pediatrics at Yeditepe University in Istanbul. His research covers child neurology, especially neuromuscular disorders, genetics, and clinical trials for pediatric muscle diseases.

He graduated from Hacettepe University School of Medicine in 1978 and completed pediatrics training there in 1982. He trained in child neurology in Canada (1984–1985) and joined Hacettepe as faculty in 1988. He became a professor in 1996 and also teaches at Yeditepe University.

Topaloğlu has won several awards, including the Hacettepe University Medicine Award (2002), TÜBİTAK Medical Research Award (2003), and the Gaetano Conte Academy of Myology Clinical Research Award (2015). He is a lifetime member of the Turkish Academy of Sciences and has been recognized as a scholar by the British Council and AFM.

His work helped identify more than 25 new inherited neuromuscular conditions in children, such as muscular dystrophies, myopathies, neuropathies, ataxias, and mitochondrial disorders. He contributed to discovering the LAMA2 gene as a major cause of a severe congenital muscular dystrophy and has been involved in developing genetic therapies for spinal muscular atrophy (SMA) and Duchenne muscular dystrophy (DMD). He helped shape care guidelines for SMA and showed that early nusinersen treatment improves outcomes, underscoring the importance of early diagnosis and newborn screening.

Topaloğlu’s research also linked various gene mutations to muscle-eye-brain disease and dystroglycanopathies, highlighting how problems in gene function lead to these conditions. He and colleagues identified many related mutations across several genes. From 2018 to 2022, he participated in international efforts to develop guidelines for Guillain–Barré syndrome and chronic inflammatory demyelinating polyneuropathy.