Ronald S. Swerdloff, MD

Chief, Division of Endocrinology, Diabetes and Metabolism, Associate Chair of the Department of Medicine and professor of medicine at Harbor-UCLA Medical Center

Dr. Swerdloff is the Chief, Division of Endocrinology, Diabetes and Metabolism, Associate Chair of the Department of Medicine and professor of medicine in the Division of Endocrinology at Harbor-UCLA Medical Center in Los Angeles. He is one of the nation’s leading endocrinology researchers, past President of the American Andrology Society, and recipient of the American Association of Andrology’s Distinguished Andrologist Award in 2004.

Dr. Swerdloff has given more than 200 scientific presentations and published well over 250 scientific articles in professional journals, including the Journal of Clinical Endocrinology and Metabolism, Endocrinology, New England Journal of Medicine, Science, and the Journal of Neuroendocrinology.  He has contributed chapters or served as the editor of a large number of medical and scientific books; and has served as editor, editorial board member and/or reviewer for many scientific journals, including the New England Journal of Medicine, Journal of Clinical Endocrinology and Metabolism, American Journal of Physiology, and Journal of Urology. 

Dr. Swerdloff received his bachelor’s degree from the University of California at Los Angeles, and his medical degree from the University of California at San Francisco.  In addition to the academic and research positions he presently holds, he consults with a number of major pharmaceutical firms and serves as Director of the World Health Organization’s Collaborating Center for Research in Human Reproduction, the Mellon Center for Men’s Health and the National Insistutes of Health (NIH) Contraceptive Clinical Trial Center.

Dr. Swerdloff joined the faculty at Harbor-UCLA Medical Center in 1969.  His research interests involve many aspects of basic male reproductive physiology and clinical reproductive investigation. Ongoing work includes the regulation of spermatogenesis, regulation of the androgen receptor gene, neuroregulation of gonadotropin secretion, development of male contraceptive agents and the pharmacology of androgen hormones.  His research activities also address the regulation of apoptosis in the testis, ethnic differences in the reproductive endocrine system, the role of 5-alpha reduced androgens in the prevention of osteoporosis and frailty in elderly men, factors influencing male fertility, the molecular basis and neurobiology of cognitive dysfunction in Klinefelter’s syndrome, and sex steroid effects on cognition and neurodegenerative disorders. 

He and his research associates at Harbor-UCLA developed and maintain a colony of XXY mice, which they actively employ in various mouse model studies of reproductive biology, cognitive and sociobehavioral research involving Klinefelter syndrome.  Techniques include tissue culture, light, confocal and electron microscopy, morphometry, immunoassays, bioassays, transillumination for staging of spermatogenesis, laser dissection microsurgery, sperm function assessment and a broad spectrum of molecular biologic methods, including microarrays.