Prof. Sir Michael Owen
Chair of Trustees and Awards Committee
Mike is Professor of Psychological Medicine, at Cardiff University. He trained in medicine and obtained a PhD in neuroscience at Birmingham University before moving to London to train in psychiatry at the Maudsley Hospital and molecular genetics at St. Mary's Hospital Medical School.
He was appointed as Senior Lecturer in Cardiff in 1990 and from 1998-2019 was Head of the Department of Psychological Medicine and Clinical Neurosciences. He was also Director of the MRC Centre for Neuropsychiatric Genetics and Genomics from 2009-2019.
His research focuses on the genetics of psychiatric and neurodevelopmental disorders and is aimed at understanding disease mechanisms, improving diagnostic processes and identifying new treatment opportunities. He was President of the International Society of Psychiatric Genetics (ISPG) from 1993-2014 and has twice been elected to the council of the Academy of Medical Sciences.
He was awarded the Stromgren Medal for psychiatric research in 2011, the Lieber Prize for schizophrenia research in 2012, the William K Warren Distinguished Investigator Award for schizophrenia research in 2013, the Lifetime Achievement Award of ISPG in 2015, and the British Neuroscience Association Award for Outstanding Contribution to Neuroscience in 2017. He practised as a consultant psychiatrist until February 2016.