Mark S. George, MD received his medical degree from the Medical University of South Carolina (MUSC) in Charleston in 1985, where he continued with dual residencies and board certification in both neurology and psychiatry.

He completed serial research fellowships focusing on brain imaging (PET, SPECT, MRI) and the then new field of brain stimulation. In 1990 at Queen Square London, he wandered into John Rothwell’s laboratory, after hearing about transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) from a patient in the elevator. Later while at the Biological Psychiatry Branch of the National Institute of Mental Health in Bethesda, MD he performed pioneering imaging, healthy volunteer and patient studies with prefrontal TMS, launching it to its now widespread research and clinical use.  

Specifically 1993 while at the NIMH, he discovered that daily prefrontal rTMS over several weeks could treat depression and ever since he has worked to grow the science of TMS, both in terms of how it works in the brain, and in critically evaluating its therapeutic applications, especially in treating depression.

He returned to MUSC in 1996 and started the research imaging center, which he led until 2007. In June 1998 at MUSC, he also helped pioneer another new treatment for resistant depression, cervical vagus nerve stimulation (VNS). This was FDA approved in 2006.

Dr. George is thus a world expert in brain imaging and brain stimulation, particularly combining the two. Clinically he is an expert on depression and several other neuropsychiatric disorders. He is the editor-in-chief of a new journal he launched with Elsevier in 2008 called, Brain Stimulation: Basic, Translation and Clinical Research in Neuromodulation. He has served as the chief editor for over 15 years now and this journal is the top in its field. He has published over 500 scientific articles or book chapters, and has written or edited 6 books, several with multiple editions.

He has been continuously funded by NIH and other funding agencies since his fellowships and has received many international awards.

Mark S. George, MD
Distinguished University Professor of Psychiatry, Radiology and Neuroscience
Layton McCurdy Endowed Chair, Director, Brain Stimulation Division 
Editor-in-Chief, Brain Stimulation: Basic, Translational and Clinical Research in Neuromodulation

502 North, Institute of Psychiatry
67 President St. 
MSC 864
Charleston, SC 29425
email georgem@musc.edu

843 876 5142

Staff Psychiatrist, Ralph H. Johnson VA Medical Center, Charleston