Munroe-Meyer Institute Director

Karoly Mirnics, MD, PhD, is director of the Munroe-Meyer Institute at the University of Nebraska Medical Center.

Dr. Mirnics obtained his MD from the University of Novi Sad School of Medicine in his hometown in 1986 and his PhD from Semmelweis University in Budapest, Hungary. He completed his postdoctoral fellowship at the University of Pittsburgh. 

Dr. Mirnics established his own laboratory in 2000 at the Department of Psychiatry at the University of Pittsburgh, where he rose to the rank of associate professor in 2006. That year, his laboratory moved to the Department of Psychiatry at Vanderbilt University in Nashville. In 2010, he was named James G. Blakemore Professor of Psychiatry, and he also served as the departmental vice chair for research and associate director of the Vanderbilt Kennedy Center. 

Dr. Mirnics has a broad background in molecular neurobiology of brain diseases, with more than 20 years of experience in various molecular biology techniques. His research group is actively pursuing projects that include transcriptome changes across human brain diseases, animal models of neurodevelopmental and psychiatric disorders, effects of maternal immune activation and environment on gene expression, and neuroprotection by activity.

To illustrate his innovativeness and willingness to explore unconventional research: He was the first to perform a DNA microarray analysis of brain tissue, pioneered molecular pathway analyses, characterized immune system dysfunction in schizophrenia and autism, pioneered in situ proteomics in neuroscience, developed a new microarray platform, identified neuroprotection of enriched environment in Alzheimer’s Disease models, holds a patent for RGS4 as a schizophrenia susceptibility gene, and developed a novel transgenic mouse technology, using BAC-driven, miRNA-mediated silencing in vivo. He has collaborated with more than 30 groups of investigators over the last 10 years.