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Volume CXXXIII, Number 8 |
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Nobel Laureate speaks at Common Hour
HEATHER WISH
STAFF WRITER
Nobel Prize-winner Torsten N. Wiesel M.D., spoke at last week's Common
Hour his many contributions to the field of neuroscience of vision. He
spoke about everything from his research experience on information processing
in the visual region of the brain to his opinions on education and philosophy.
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| (Henry Coppola, Bowdoin Orient) |
Dr. Wiesel began his medical career by receiving his M.D. degree in 1954
from the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm, Sweden, and his interests
in psychiatry led him to work in mental hospitals. He spoke briefly about
his work with schizophrenic patients as a young doctor at a hospital in
Stockholm and how studying mental patients' neurological problems is essential
to understanding pathways of the brain. After completing his medical studies,
Wiesel stayed at the University where he taught psychology for a year.
Wiesel was then invited to the United States in 1955 to study with neurophysiologist
Stephen Kuffler at Johns Hopkins University. Joined by Dr. David Hubel,
Wiesel set out to explore the receptive field properties of cells in central
visual pathways.
In reference to his research process and results, Wiesel tried to find
ways of communicating very complicated biological systems to an audience
with little expertise on the topic of neuroscience. Foe example, he referred
to the way in which eyes perceive images and how the brain interprets
these perceptions as a "beautiful science." He continued by
describing the images created by the brain as "line drawings,"
and emphasized the importance of "wiring," or the way in which
signals pass from the receptors in the eye to the brain and back.
Wiesel also spoke about a very interesting set of experiments in which
one eye was deprived of normal function. Compared to normally functioning
eyes, the "wiring" between the brain and the covered eye somehow
modified itself to work in the different conditions. He related this experiment
to his own research on the examination of single vision cells as a way
to decode how images are seen.
As a professor at both at Johns Hopkins and Harvard Universities also
having served as president of Rockefeller University from 1991 to 1998,
Wiesel was very adamant about the opportunities students have at institutions
such as Bowdoin and in the future. To future researchers he spoke with
inspiration about "great promise" and abundant opportunity to
discover.
"I would like to end on a positive note during this depressing time
for many people in this country," Wiesel said.