Shitij Kapur


Shitij Kapur, MBBS, PhD, FMedSci, is the Dean of the Faculty of Medicine Dentistry and Health Sciences and Assistant Vice-Chancellor of the University of Melbourne. He was formerly Dean and Head of School at the Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology and Neuroscience at King's College London, and professor of psychiatry at the University of Toronto. Kapur's research has made major contributions to the understanding of psychosis and antipsychotic treatment. From 2010-2015 he co-lead , an international consortium of scientists from 19 institutions from 9 EU countries, NEWMEDS, one the largest academic-industry research collaboration projects to find new methods for the development of drugs for schizophrenia and depression.

Career

Research focus/interests

Professor Kapur's research aims to understand the basis of psychosis and the improvement of antipsychotics through the use of brain imaging, clinical studies, and animal models.

Notable contributions to research

Kapur's work on antipsychotics has had an important influence on the understanding of how these drugs work and how they are used. Through brain imaging and clinical studies, he has found that antipsychotics block dopamine D2 receptors to varying degrees, thereby making a strong argument for lower doses. His research has also contested the “delayed onset” theory of antipsychotics, suggesting that action begins within the first few days of treatment. His articulation of the aberrant salience hypothesis as an explanation linking dopamine to psychosis is a classic in the field having been cited over 2,000 times.

Past appointments

Prior to his current position as Dean and Assistant Vice Chancellor at the University of Melbourne, Kapur was the Executive Dean and Professor of Psychiatry at King's College London. Prior to that Kapur was a Professor of Psychiatry at the University of Toronto. While there, he served as the Vice-President for Research at the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health. From 2001 to 2007, he was a Canada Research Chair at the University of Toronto

Awards and Honours

Kapur has won many awards, including the Joel Elkes Award of the American College of Neuropsychopharmacology in 2007, Paul Janssen Award of the International College of Neuropsychopharmacology, A.E. Bennett Award of the Society for Biological Psychiatry, and the Research Prize from the World Congress of Biological Psychiatry.
Kapur is a Distinguished Fellow of the American Psychiatric Association, a Fellow of the Academy of Medical Sciences, a Fellow of King's College London and has an Honorary Doctorate from the University of Copenhagen.

Leadership roles and Contributions to the Field

Kapur was a non-Executive Director of the South London and Maudsley Hospital, one of Europe's pre-eminent psychiatric hospitals. He currently serves as a non-Executive Director of the Royal Melbourne Hospital one of Australia's leading tertiary hospitals. He serves as a Director on the Board of the Walter and Eliza Hall Institute of Medical Research, Australia's leading independent biomedical research Institute, and also serve on the Board of the St. Vincent's Institute of Medical Research in Melbourne. He is the Chair of the Executive Board of the , a partnership of 10 hospitals and seven independent medical research institutes and the University of Melbourne.
He is a founding board member of the Schizophrenia International Research Society and served on the Board of Trustees from 2010–14, and as an elected Treasurer from 2015-2017. Kapur was an Executive Committee member of the European College of Neuropsychopharmacology and served as the Secretary of the from 2009 to 2012
Kapur has served on numerous editorial boards, including those of Schizophrenia Research, Schizophrenia Bulletin, BMC Psychiatry, Archives of General Psychiatry, World Journal of Biological Psychiatry, American Journal of Psychiatry, and Neuropsychopharmacology.
He is an external grant referee for many research councils including the Medical Research Council, UK, the Medical Research Council of Canada, the Canadian Institutes of Health Research, the , and the .

Publications

Kapur has published extensively, with over 300 peer-reviewed articles, which have been cited over 45,000 times with an H-index of 104, and eight of his publications cited over a 1,000 times each.