Michael C. O'Donovan is a

Scottish Scottish usually refers to something of, from, or related to Scotland, including: *Scottish Gaelic, a Celtic Goidelic language of the Indo-European language family native to Scotland *Scottish English *Scottish national identity, the Scottish ide ...

psychiatric geneticist who researches the

genetics Genetics is the study of genes, genetic variation, and heredity in organisms.Hartl D, Jones E (2005) It is an important branch in biology because heredity is vital to organisms' evolution. Gregor Mendel, a Moravian Augustinians, Augustinian ...

schizophrenia Schizophrenia () is a mental disorder characterized variously by hallucinations (typically, Auditory hallucination#Schizophrenia, hearing voices), delusions, thought disorder, disorganized thinking and behavior, and Reduced affect display, f ...

. He is a clinical professor in the Division of Psychological Medicine and Clinical Neurosciences and the deputy director of the MRC Centre for Neuropsychiatric Genetics and Genomics at the

Cardiff University School of Medicine The Cardiff University School of Medicine () is the medical school of Cardiff University and is located in Cardiff, Wales, UK. Founded in 1893 as part of the University College of South Wales and Monmouthshire, it is the oldest of the three med ...

Cardiff Cardiff (; ) is the capital city, capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of Wales. Cardiff had a population of in and forms a Principal areas of Wales, principal area officially known as the City and County of Ca ...

Wales Wales ( ) is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It is bordered by the Irish Sea to the north and west, England to the England–Wales border, east, the Bristol Channel to the south, and the Celtic ...

. He also leads the Schizophrenia Group of the Psychiatric Genomics Consortium. Educated at

Glasgow University The University of Glasgow (abbreviated as ''Glas.'' in post-nominals; ) is a public research university in Glasgow, Scotland. Founded by papal bull in , it is the fourth-oldest university in the English-speaking world and one of Scotland's four ...

, he also serves as Academic Psychiatry Lead for the

Royal College of Psychiatrists The Royal College of Psychiatrists is the main professional organisation of psychiatrists in the United Kingdom, and is responsible for representing psychiatrists, for psychiatric research and for providing public information about mental healt ...

in Wales. He was lead author of a 2014 study in ''

Nature Nature is an inherent character or constitution, particularly of the Ecosphere (planetary), ecosphere or the universe as a whole. In this general sense nature refers to the Scientific law, laws, elements and phenomenon, phenomena of the physic ...

'' which identified over 100

genetic loci In genetics, a locus (: loci) is a specific, fixed position on a chromosome where a particular gene or genetic marker is located. Each chromosome carries many genes, with each gene occupying a different position or locus; in humans, the total numb ...

associated with an increased risk of schizophrenia. The study, the largest of its kind undertaken at the time, was covered extensively in the media. It was also praised by Thomas Insel, the then-director of the

National Institute of Mental Health The National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) is one of 27 institutes and centers that make up the National Institutes of Health (NIH). The NIH, in turn, is an agency of the United States Department of Health and Human Services and is the primar ...

, who described the study as "a big step forward".

References

External links

Faculty page
* Living people Psychiatric geneticists Scottish psychiatrists Scottish geneticists Academics of Cardiff University Alumni of the University of Glasgow Alumni of the University of Wales Schizophrenia researchers Year of birth missing (living people) {{Scotland-academic-bio-stub