Károly Mirnics, MD, PhD
Hattie B. Munroe Professor
Dean and Director, Munroe-Meyer Institute
Professor of Psychiatry, Biochemistry & Molecular Biology, UNMC
Károly Mirnics, MD, PhD, is the dean and director of the Munroe-Meyer Institute and Hattie B. Munroe Professor of Psychiatry, Biochemistry & Molecular Biology at the University of Nebraska Medical Center.
Mirnics obtained his medical degree from the University of Novi Sad School of Medicine in his hometown in Yugoslavia in 1986 and his doctorate from Semmelweis University in Budapest, Hungary. He completed his postdoctoral fellowship at the University of Pittsburgh.
Mirnics established his own laboratory in 2000 at the Department of Psychiatry at University of Pittsburgh, where he rose to the rank of associate professor in 2006. In 2006, 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.
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.
His innovativeness and willingness to explore unconventional research are best illustrated by the following: he was the first person 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 is very collaborative, and he has worked with over 30 groups of investigators over the last ten years.
- PhD: Semmelweis University in Budapest, Hungary, 2010.
- MD: University of Novi Sad School of Medicine, Yugoslavia, 1986.
- Human Gross Anatomy, Vanderbilt University.
- Neurobiology of Disease, Vanderbilt University.
- NURO346, Vanderbilt University.
- NURO292, Vanderbilt University.
- NURO366, Vanderbilt University.
- NUSC235, Vanderbilt University.
- Animal models of neurodevelopmental and psychiatric disorders.
- Effects of environment on gene expression.
- Effects of Environment*Environment interaction on the developing brain.
- Effects of Gene*Environment interaction on the developing brain.
- Neuroprotection by activity.
- Transcriptome changes across human brain disorders.
- Peripheral biomarkers of neurodevelopmental and neuropsychiatric disorders.
- American College of Neuropsychopharmacology Fellow, 2014.
- NARSAD council, 2010.
- Daniel X. Freedman Prize runner-up, 2006.
- Hungarian Academy of Sciences, Foreign Scientist Council, 2005.
- European College of Neuropsychopharmacology, 2005.
- American Association for Advancement of Science.
- American College of Neuropsychopharmacology.
- European College of Neuropsychopharmacology.
- Federation of Societies for Experimental Biology.
- Hungarian Academy of Sciences Foreign Scientist Council.
- Hungarian Neuropsychopharmacological Society.
- International Brain Research Organization.
- International Society for Interferon and Cytokine Research.
- Schizophrenia International Research Society.