Dr. Alfred G. Gilman was born in New Haven, Connecticut in 1941. He received his B.S. (summa cum laude) in Biochemistry in 1962 from Yale University, and his M.D. and Ph.D. in Pharmacology in 1969 from Case Western Reserve University. He completed his postdoctoral training in the Laboratory of Biochemical Genetics at the National Institutes of Health (1969-71). In 1971 Dr. Gilman began a ten-year stay at the University of Virginia in Charlottesville. His positions in the Dept. Of Pharmacology included Assistant Professor (1971-73), Associate Professor (1973-77), and Professor (1977-81). In addition he was Director of the Medical Scientist Training Program (1978-81). Dr. Gilman became Chairman of the Department of Pharmacology at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center at Dallas in 1981. He was named a Regental Professor in 1995. Dr. Gilman discovered, characterized, and purified a set of guanine nucleotide-binding regulatory proteins termed G proteins. His observations provided for the first time a firm molecular basis for understanding certain signal transduction processes present throughout nature. He was also the primary editor (in 1980, 1985, and 1990) of the best known textbook of Pharmacology, Goodman and Gilman's The Pharmacological Basis of Therapeutics. In 2004, Dr. Gilman was named Dean of Southwestern Medical School. In addition, in 2006 he became Executive Vice President for Academic Affairs and Provost of the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Cener.
