Torsten Wiesel

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Torsten Wiesel
Wiesel in 2011
7th President of Rockefeller University
In office
1991–1998
Preceded byDavid Baltimore
Succeeded byArnold J. Levine
Personal details
Born
Torsten Nils Wiesel

(1924-06-03) 3 June 1924 (age 99)
Uppsala, Sweden
Spouses
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(m. 1956; div. 1970)​
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(m. 1973; div. 1981)​
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(m. 1995; div. 2007)​
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(m. 2008)​
Alma materKarolinska Institute
Known forVisual system
Awards
Scientific career
Institutions

Torsten Nils Wiesel (born 3 June 1924) is a Swedish

Roger W. Sperry[8] for his independent research on the cerebral hemispheres.[9]

Career

Wiesel was born in

David Hubel, beginning a collaboration that would last over twenty years. In 1959 Wiesel and Hubel moved to Harvard University
. He became an instructor in pharmacology at Harvard Medical School, beginning a 24-year career with the university. He became professor in the new department of neurobiology in 1968 and its chair in 1971.

In 1983, Wiesel joined the faculty of Rockefeller University as Vincent and Brooke Astor Professor and head of the Laboratory of Neurobiology. He was president of the university from 1991 to 1998.[10] At Rockefeller University he remains the director of the Shelby White and Leon Levy Center for Mind, Brain and Behavior.

From 2000-2009, Wiesel served as Secretary-General of the Human Frontier Science Program,

Pew Center on Global Climate Change, the Hospital for Special Surgery, and an advisory board member of the European Brain Research Institute (EBRI).[13]

Wiesel has also served as chair of the board of the Aaron Diamond AIDS Research Center (1995–2001), president of the Society for Neuroscience (1978–1979), and the International Brain Research Organization (1998–2004). He was chair of the board of governors of the New York Academy of Sciences (2001–2006); and he was the academy's chairman and interim director in 2001–2002.[14]

Research

The Hubel and Wiesel experiments greatly expanded the scientific knowledge of sensory processing. In one experiment, done in 1959, they inserted a

primary visual cortex of an anesthetized cat. They then projected patterns of light and dark on a screen in front of the cat. They found that some neurons fired rapidly when presented with lines at one angle, while others responded best to another angle. They called these neurons "simple cells." Still other neurons, which they termed "complex cells," responded best to lines of a certain angle moving in one direction. These studies showed how the visual system builds an image from simple stimuli into more complex representations.[15]

Hubel and Wiesel were awarded the Nobel Prize in 1981 for their work on ocular dominance columns in the 1960s and 1970s. By depriving kittens from using one eye, they showed that columns in the primary visual cortex receiving inputs from the other eye took over the areas that would normally receive input from the deprived eye. These kittens also did not develop areas receiving input from both eyes, a feature needed for binocular vision. Hubel and Wiesel's experiments showed that the ocular dominance develops irreversibly[verification needed] early in childhood development. These studies opened the door for the understanding and treatment of childhood cataracts and strabismus. They were also important in the study of cortical plasticity.[15]

Awards and honors

Wiesel is a member of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences, the Serbian Academy of Sciences and Arts,[16] and a foreign fellow of the Indian National Science Academy.[citation needed] He also holds the following awards and honors:

In 2001, Wiesel was nominated for a position on an advisory panel in the

whistleblower Gerald Keusch described in an interview as "lightweights" with "no scientific credibility". When Wiesel's name was rejected, an official in Thompson's office told Keusch that Wiesel had "signed too many full-page letters in The New York Times critical of President Bush." This incident was cited by the advocacy group Union of Concerned Scientists as part of a report detailing their allegations of abuse of science under President George W. Bush's administration.[24][25]

Wiesel was among the eight 2005 recipients of the National Medal of Science.[23] In 2006, he was awarded the Ramon Y Cajal Gold Medal from the Spanish National Research Council (CSIC - Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Cientificas). In 2007, both Wiesel and Hubel were awarded the Marshall M. Parks, MD Medal from The Children's Eye Foundation.

Personal life

Wiesel is married to Lizette Mususa Reyes (m. 2008).[4] Wiesel was married to Teeri Stenhammar from 1956-1970, Ann Yee from 1973-1981,[4] and author and editor Jean Stein from 1995-2007.[4] His daughter Sara Elisabeth was born in 1975.[4]

Human rights

Wiesel has done much work as a global human rights advocate. He served for 10 years (1994–2004) as chair of the

Institute of Medicine in 2005, in recognition of this important work.[citation needed
] In 2009, Wiesel was awarded the Grand Cordon Order of the Rising Sun Medal in Japan.

He is a founding member of the Israeli-Palestinian Science Organization, a nongovernmental nonprofit established in 2004 to support collaborative research between scientists in Israel and Palestine.[26]

See also

References

  1. ^
    PMID 22841302
    .
  2. ^ a b "Professor Torsten Wiesel ForMemRS". London: Royal Society. Archived from the original on 11 November 2015.
  3. ^ a b "Fellowship of the Royal Society 1660-2015". London: Royal Society. Archived from the original on 15 October 2015.
  4. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o "Torsten N. Wiesel - Biographical". Nobelprize.org. Archived from the original on 9 July 2015. Retrieved 6 September 2015.
  5. PMID 24172972
    .
  6. PMID 14403679
    .
  7. PMID 14449617
    .
  8. doi:10.1098/rsbm.1997.0025
    .
  9. ^ Multiple sources:
  10. ^ Angier, Natalie. "Acting President of Rockefeller U. to Stay at Least 3 More Years," New York Times. 21 February 1992; Sengupta, Somini. "Princeton Cancer Expert Is New Rockefeller U. President," New York Times. 1 July 1998.
  11. ^ "| Human Frontier Science Program".
  12. ^ "Nibs 北京生命科学研究所". Archived from the original on 8 October 2009. Retrieved 8 November 2009. NIBS
  13. ^ [1] Archived 4 January 2010 at the Wayback Machine
  14. ^ Overbye, Dennis. "New York Academy of Sciences Elects a New Chief Executive," New York Times. 19 November 2002.
  15. ^
    Wadsworth Publishing. [ISBN missing
    ]
  16. ^ "The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences: Torsten Wiesel". Retrieved 1 May 2009. [dead link]
  17. ^ Japanese Ministry of Foreign Affairs, "2009 Autumn Conferment of Decorations on Foreign Nationals," p. 1.
  18. ^ "University of Cambodia". Retrieved 7 May 2018.[permanent dead link]
  19. ^ "Torsten Nils Wiesel".
  20. ^ "Torsten N. Wiesel".
  21. ^ "APS Member History".
  22. ^ "David Rall Award Recipients". iom.nationalacademies.org. Archived from the original on 11 November 2015. Retrieved 21 October 2015.
  23. ^ a b National Eye Institute: "NEI Grantees Receive National Medals of Science," Archived 2009-09-24 at the Wayback Machine 2007.
  24. PMID 15254502
    .
  25. ^ Seth Shulman (2007). Undermining Science: Suppression and Distortion in the Bush Administration. University of California Press.
  26. ^ a b "Torsten N. Wiesel - Facts". nobelprize.org.

External links

  • Media related to Torsten Wiesel at Wikimedia Commons
  • Torsten Wiesel on Nobelprize.org Edit this at Wikidata including the Nobel Lecture 8 December 1981 The Postnatal Development of the Visual Cortex and the Influence of Environment

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