Rate My Professor Oscar Marín

Professor Oscar Marín is Professor of Neuroscience at King’s College London, serving as Director of the Centre for Developmental Neurobiology, Director of the MRC Centre for Neurodevelopmental Disorders, and Head of the Department of Developmental Neurobiology in the School of Neuroscience. His laboratory investigates the development of the cerebral cortex in health and disease, focusing on cortical interneurons, their migration, allocation, connectivity, and interactions with glutamatergic projection neurons. This research elucidates mechanisms underlying functional cortical networks and contributes to understanding the aetiology of neurodevelopmental and psychiatric disorders, including autism and schizophrenia.

Marín graduated in Biological Sciences from Universidad Complutense de Madrid in 1993 and earned his PhD there in 1997 with extraordinary award and European mention. He conducted postdoctoral research at the University of California, San Francisco in John L. R. Rubenstein’s laboratory from 1997 to 2003, then led an independent group at the Instituto de Neurociencias in Alicante, Spain from 2003 until joining King’s College London in 2014. His achievements include election as Fellow of the Royal Society (FRS) in 2022, Fellow of the Academy of Medical Sciences (FMedSci) in 2020, ECNP Neuropsychopharmacology Award (2023), FENS-EJN Award (2024), Prix Roger de Spoelberch (2014), Ramón y Cajal Medal (2017), ERC Advanced Grant, and Wellcome Trust Investigator Award. Key publications encompass 'Pyramidal cell regulation of interneuron survival sculpts cortical networks' (Nature, 2018), 'Optimization of interneuron function by direct coupling of cell migration and axonal targeting programs' (Nature Neuroscience, 2018), 'Early emergence of cortical interneuron diversity in the mouse embryo' (Science, 2018), 'A postnatal molecular switch drives activity-dependent maturation of parvalbumin interneurons' (Cell, 2025), and 'Regulation of PV interneuron plasticity by neuropeptide-encoding genes' (Nature, 2025). With over 30,000 citations, his work profoundly influences developmental neurobiology. He leads major grants from Wellcome Trust, Wolfson Foundation, and others, and supervises PhD students.