PHILADELPHIA - Adrian Raine has been named the newest Penn Integrates Knowledge professor at the University of Pennsylvania.

He is a professor of psychology and neuroscience at the University of Southern California and at Penn will hold the Richard Perry University Professorship, named in recognition of a gift from Richard Perry, a Penn trustee and founder of the investment management firm Perry Capital.  

Raine will hold appointments in the Department of Criminology of the School of Arts and Sciences and in the Department of Psychiatry of the School of Medicine.  

He is internationally renowned for his integration of biological and social perspectives on the prediction and explanation of violent behavior.  His discoveries have identified brain structures, nutritional influences, genetic factors and social environments that foster violent criminal tendencies.  He is the author of "The Psychopathology of Crime: Criminal Behavior as a Clinical Disorder."  From 1990 to 1992, Raine was a consultant to the National Academy of Sciences Panel on the Control and Understanding of Violent Behavior.

PIK professorships, a program conceived by Penn President Amy Gutmann, are awarded to exceptional scholars whose research and teaching are enriched by the innovative  integration of knowledge across academic disciplines.

"Adrian Raine exemplifies the cross-disciplinary research and teaching essential to understanding our society's most pressing problems," Gutmann said.  "His appointment deepens our exceptional faculty resources in the study of violent behavior and  its multiple causes.  His addition to our great faculty is another step in building Penn's growing eminence as a university committed to engaging big problems to the benefit of both society and the University."

"We look forward to the strengthening of intellectual synergies across disciplines that come from adding faculty like Adrian Raine," Penn Provost Ron Daniels said.  "His interdisciplinary approach to predicting and explaining violent behavior will further enhance the intellectual linkages between the School of Arts and Sciences and the School of Medicine and will undoubtedly push forward the frontiers of knowledge in this area."

Raine received his bachelors and masters degrees in experimental psychology in England from Oxford University and his doctorate in psychology from York University.  His appointment will be effective July 1.