Louis Clark Vanuxem Lecture April 14, 2005
Michael Gazzaniga received a Ph.D in Psychobiology from the California Institute of Technology, where he worked under the guidance of Roger Sperry, with primary responsibility for initiating human split-brain research. He subsequently made remarkable advances in our understanding of functional lateralization in the brain and how the cerebral hemispheres communicate with one another. He has published many books accessible to a lay audience, such as Mind Matters and Nature's Mind which, along with his participation in the public television specials The Brain and The Mind, have been instrumental in making information about brain function generally accessible--essential in obaining public support clinical and basic science research. His many scholarly publications include the landmark 1995 book for MIT Press, The Cognitive Neurosciences, now in its third edition, which is recognized as the sourcebook for the field. Dr. Gazzaniga's long and distinguished teaching and mentoring career has included beginning and developing Centers for Cognitive Neuroscience at the University of California-Davis and Dartmouth, supervising the work and encouraging the careers of many young scientists, and founding the Neuroscience Institute and the Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience, of which he is the Editor-in-Chief. He is much sought- is an advisor to various institutes involved in brain research, and is a member of the President's Council on Bioethics.
