Juan M. Pascual holds appointments to the faculty of the Departments of Neurology and Neurotherapeutics, Physiology and Pediatrics and is Director of the Rare Brain Disorders Clinic and Laboratory. He is also a member of the Division of Pediatric Neurology, of the graduate programs in Neuroscience and Integrative Biology, and of the postgraduate clinical training programs in Neurology, Pediatric Neurology, Pediatrics and Medical Genetics.

Dr. Pascual received his M.D. degree from the Universidad de Granada, Spain (founded in 1526 by Emperor Charles V over the school established by the Nasrid Sultan of Granada in 1349). He received his Ph.D. degree in Molecular Physiology and Biophysics from Baylor College of Medicine in Houston, Texas. His postdoctoral research was conducted at the Center for Molecular Recognition, College of Physicians and Surgeons of Columbia University and, later, at the Colleen Giblin Research Laboratories for Pediatric Neurology at the same institution. He also obtained residency training in Pediatrics at Washington University School of Medicine- St. Louis Children’s Hospital and in Neurology and Pediatric Neurology at the Neurological Institute of New York- Columbia University Medical Center. He received certification in Neurology with Special Qualification in Child Neurology from the American Board of Psychiatry and Neurology.

As a clinician, he specializes in genetic and metabolic diseases of the nervous and neuromuscular systems of infants, children and adults with a particular emphasis on complex diagnostic problems, second opinions for patients visiting from the rest of the U.S. and abroad, and in pilot and national clinical trials. Dr. Pascual has special clinical research expertise in glucose metabolism, mitochondrial and unusual degenerative and multi-organ disorders.

As one of few pediatric neurologists in the nation who is also a laboratory scientist, Dr. Pascual is interested in the molecular mechanisms that cause inherited metabolic and excitability disorders using electrophysiology and nuclear magnetic resonance (MRI) both in human subjects and in models of human diseases. His laboratory is located in the newest biomedical research building (NL) at UT Southwestern and is an integral part of the Department of Neurology and Neurotherapeutics.

An avid reader, speaker and humanist, Dr. Pascual is also interested in metaphysics, epistemology and the philosophy of mind.