Paul Insel's Biography

Paul Insel, Vice-Chair and Distinguished Professor, Pharmacology, University of California San Diego

Dr. Insel attended received his M.D. from the University of Michigan and subsequent clinical training on the Harvard Medical Service at Boston City Hospital. He then began research training/efforts at NIH in the NICHD Gerontology Research Center and the NCI Laboratory of Theoretical Biology and subsequently in the Cardiovascular Research Institute and Departments of Medicine and Pharmacology at UCSF. He joined the UCSF faculty as Assistant Professor-in-residence in the Dept. of Medicine and subsequently was appointed as Assistant Professor in the Division of Pharmacology, Dept. of Medicine at UCSD, where he is currently Vice-Chair/Distinguished Professor of Pharmacology and Distinguished Professor of Medicine. Since 1989, he has been the Director of the UCSD Medical Scientist (MD/PhD) Training Program. Dr. Insel is a member of the Advisory Panel on Research of the American Association of Medical Colleges, has been a consultant to numerous universities, foundations, companies and government agencies and given invited seminars and lectures at numerous societies and universities. He holds a Doc. Hon Causa from the University of Paris and is a Fellow, American Association for the Advancement of Science. Dr. Insel has served as Editor or Senior Editor of numerous scientific journals, including Journal of Clinical Investigation, Molecular Pharmacology, British Journal of Pharmacology, and American Journal of Physiology-Cell Physiology. Currently, he is Editor of the Annual Review of Pharmacology and Toxicology and co-Head of Faculty of the Faculty of 1000Prime in Pharmacology and Drug Discovery.

Dr. Insel’s major research efforts have focused on studies of G-protein-coupled receptors (GPCRs) with respect to their expression, signaling mechanisms, regulation, effects in target cells and roles in health and disease. He has devoted major efforts to studies of adrenergic and P2Y receptors using a variety of experimental systems and the application of biochemical, cell biological and molecular biological approaches. He has not only studied GPCRs but also heterotrimeric G-proteins, G-protein-regulated effectors, the compartmentation of signaling molecules in lipid raft/caveolin domains, mechanisms of cAMP-promoted apoptosis, and he has used various “omics” strategies to define GPCR expression and the cAMP-regulated transcriptome and proteome. Dr. Insel has published >280 original articles and 150 reviews, invited articles and book chapters.