Dr. Ian A. Paul

Dr. Paul is Director of Medical Student Education in Psychiatry and Professor in the Departments of Psychiatry & Human Behavior, Neurobiology & Anatomical Sciences and Pharmacology at the University of Mississippi Medical Center (UMMC). He also serves as Education Director of the Center for Developmental Disorders Research. His current professional focus is on program development and enhancement, faculty mentoring, and pedagogical research. He remains an active scientist with research focused on behavioral neuropharmacology and developmental programming of the brain and behavior.

In 2006, he founded the first interdisciplinary graduate training program at UMMC, the Program in Neuroscience in which he served as Director until July of 2014. He has served as Assistant Director of the Division of Neurobiology and Behavior Research in the Department of Psychiatry & Human Behavior where he created and continues to develop the Faculty Mentoring Program. This program forms the model for a program that will be implemented department-wide this year. He is also the Education Director of the Center for Developmental Disorders Research.

Dr. Paul received his graduate training in Neurobiology at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and then completed a postdoctoral traineeship in the Laboratory of Neuroscience at the National Institutes of Health. He has published over 80 peer-reviewed manuscripts and is funded by the NIH and SAMSHA. He serves on two study NIH sections, one reviewing NRSA applications and another run by NICHD focused on Pediatrics. He also serves on the Neuroscience Training Committee of the Society for Neuroscience. In addition to advising nearly 30 students during his tenure as the Director of the Program in Neuroscience, Dr. Paul has trained six postdoctoral associates, 15 graduate students, 12 visiting students and more than 25 undergraduates.

In 2014, Dr. Paul was inducted into the Norman C. Nelson Order of Teaching Excellence at UMMC which recognizes faculty in each of the six Medical Center schools who have been cited for exemplary teaching by their students. He was then further honored as the recipient of the Regions Bank Toward Educational Advancement in Care and Health (TEACH) Prize. This prize is awarded to one faculty member each year for exceptional innovation, role modeling, professionalism, and mentoring and guidance of students.