Alumni Hall of Fame
Academic and Professional Achievement (2009)

Dr. Raymond J. Dingledine, Jr., a native of St. Marys, is a member of the Memorial High School Class of 1967. Dr. Dingledine has notably distinguished himself as a renowned and respected expert in epilepsy and associated pharmacology research.

In 1967, Ray graduated as a National Merit Scholar from Memorial High School and in the fall began his studies at Michigan State University. In 1971, Mr. Dingledine graduated with Honors from Michigan State University with a Bachelor of Science Degree in Biochemistry. From there, Ray would go west to attend Stanford University. Under the thesis supervision of Avram Goldstein, he would graduate in 1975 with a Doctorate in Pharmacology. Dr. Dingledine spent several years serving as a postdoctoral fellow at the University of Cambridge in England and University of Oslo in Norway. In 1978, he would serve one year as a Research Associate in the Department of Physiology at Duke University. In 1978, Ray would take the short walk down Tobacco Road to become an Assistant Professor in the Department of Pharmacology at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Dr. Dingledine eventually rose to full professorship and took a one year sabbatical at The Salk Institute. In 1992, Dr. Raymond Dingledine left the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill to become a Professor and Chairman of the Department of Pharmacology at Emory University School of Medicine in Atlanta, Georgia. Dr. Dingledine remains at Emory University where he continues his work for the School of Medicine and the greater university. In 2002, he was the co-founder of NeurOp Incorporated, a preclinical stage pharmaceutical company developing innovative therapeutics for neurological disorders and diseases such as Parkinson’s Disease.

Dr. Dingledine’s research and work has integrated information from a variety of experimental strategies to contribute to a better understanding of epilepsy with broad implications for other brain disorders such as stroke and schizophrenia. One of his reports, The Glycine Coagonist Report, was the fourth most highly cited paper in the field of neuroscience between 1988 and 1992. Dr. Dingledine’s publications between 1990 and 1999 ranked within the top 1% for impact factor in the neuroscience and pharmacology fields. Dr. Dingledine has received tens of millions of dollars in grant funds for his research and studies. Many of these grants were competitive renewals ranking in the highest percentiles. Raymond’s research and studies have resulted in his holding several patents and being responsible for several inventions. Dr Dingledine, the writer, has been published hundred of times in numerous abstracts, journals and books and has edited many neuroscience, epilepsy and pharmacology publications. His several hundred presentations at conferences and symposia have taken him to the United States’ greatest cities, from New York City to Washington, D.C. to San Francisco; to our most distinguished institutions of higher education from Harvard University to Yale University to University of Virginia to Vanderbilt University to University of Chicago; and around the world from Israel to England to Germany to Italy to China. Raymond has consulted with our nation’s best pharmaceutical companies including Eli Lilly and Pfizer. He has served on national committees, councils and societies. As an educator, he has mentored many doctoral students and postdoctoral fellows.

His life’s work has garnered him memberships into the Society for Neuroscience, American Epilepsy Society and American Society for Pharmacology and Experimental Therapeutics. He has received the John A. Boezi Distinguished Alumnus Award from Michigan State University, Bristol-Myers Squibb Neuroscience Award and the Jacob Javits Award in the Neurosciences.



It is for his outstanding and superior professional accomplishments, and for his work that has impacted the people of the United States of America and the world in the fields of neuroscience, epilepsy and pharmacology, that Dr. Raymond J. Dingledine, Jr. is inducted into the St. Marys Memorial High School Alumni Foundation Hall of Fame for Academic / Professional Achievement.

The above text, in its entirety, is embossed on a St. Marys Memorial High School Alumni Hall of Fame plaque permanently on display in Memorial High School.