Fellow

Professor Rawlins is Watts Professor of Psychology, University of Oxford. His research is unusually wide ranging, extending from neuroanatomical and electrophysiological studies in rodents to cognitive psychology and fMRI paradigms in humans. His research has advanced our understanding of the neuropsychology, neurophysiology and neuroanatomy of memory, emotion, neurological diseases, and schizophrenia. His work on hippocampal function in rodents was important to define its connections in spatial working memory, object recognition and contextual learning. His hippocampal studies also yielded what became the standard tests for behavioural assessment of hippocampal damage. Recognising the opportunities arising from mouse genetics he characterised paradigms for use in murine studies. One important series of studies was his work demosntrating the early, pre-clinical effects of scrapie infection as this offered a method to test therapeutic intervention. His work has not been limited to rodents, He has pioneered novel uses of MRI to differentiate neural substrates undrelying the experience of pain and this has been used to investigate the overlapping and separate influences of pschological, phsyiological and pharmacological interventions. A key observation from his clinical studies was that studies on patients with schizophrenia need to be undertaken in drug naiive individuals if misleading results are to be avoided. In addition to his research achievements, he has played an important national role in neuroscience teaching and funding. In particular, he was a key figure, together with Professor David Attwell, in developing the four year taught PhD Programmes in Neuroscience at Oxford and UCL that attract excellent students and promise much for the future of UK neuroscience