Michael Merzenich

Michael Matthias Merzenich ( ; born 1942 in Lebanon, Oregon) is an American neuroscientist and professor emeritus at the University of California, San Francisco. He took the sensory cortex maps developed by his predecessors (Archie Tunturi, Clinton Woolsey, Vernon Mountcastle, Wade Marshall, and Philip Bard) and refined them using dense micro-electrode mapping techniques. Using this, he definitively showed there to be multiple somatotopic maps of the body in the postcentral sulcus, and multiple tonotopic maps of the acoustic inputs in the superior temporal plane.

He led the cochlear implant team at UCSF, which transferred its technology to Advanced Bionics, and their version is the Clarion cochlear implant. He collaborated with Bill Jenkins and Gregg Recanzone to demonstrate sensory maps are labile into adulthood in animals performing operant sensory tasks. He collaborated with Paula Tallal, Bill Jenkins, and Steve Miller to form the company Scientific Learning. This was based on Fast ForWord software they co-invented that produces improvements in children's language skills that has been related to the magnitude of their temporal processing impairments prior to training, though the program's effectiveness is disputed.

Merzenich was director and Chief Scientific Officer of Scientific Learning between November 1996 and January 2003. Merzenich took two sabbaticals from UCSF, in 1997 and 2004. In 1997 he led research teams at Scientific Learning Corporation, and in 2004 at Posit Science Corporation. Merzenich is Chief Scientific Officer, and on the Board of Directors, at Posit Science. Merzenich grew up fascinated by science. He attended the University of Portland in Portland, Oregon earning his Bachelor of Science in 1964. He left Johns Hopkins to conduct his postdoctoral studies at the University of Wisconsin under Jerzy Rose. There, he did a cross-species analysis of the cochlear nucleus in large game cats and pinnipeds, did the first auditory cortical microelectrode maps in the macaque with John Brugge, and the first somatosensory maps in the macaque with neurosurgeon Ron Paul. He earned his neurophysiology fellowship between 1968 and 1971. Merzenich started with UCSF in 1971 as faculty member becoming full professor in 1980. Merzenich has helped to identify two distinct periods of brain plasticity: The Critical Period and the period of Adult Plasticity.

Understanding how the brain can re-wire itself has allowed Merzenich, Tallal, and other colleagues to develop strategies intended to remediate individuals with any speech, language, and reading deficits. Through research in experience dependent learning with non-human primates, neurophysiologists including Merzenich have demonstrated that neuroplasticity remains through adulthood. Further studies with monkeys suggested that the Hebbian learning principles that drive neuroplasticity can be used to treat learning-language impaired children.

Awards In May 1999, Merzenich was honored by election into the National Academy of Sciences for his research on brain plasticity.

He went on to be elected to the National Academy's Institute of Medicine in 2008, making him one of a very select few to have been elected to more than one of the National Academies.

As of 2001, he received the Award for Distinguished Scientific Contributions. In 2016 he was awarded one of the world's top neuroscience prizes, the Kavli Prize, for his achievements in the field of brain plasticity. He also became elected to the Norwegian Academy of Science and Letters.

Merzenich has published more than 200 articles.

His work is also often covered in the popular press, including The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Time and Newsweek.

He has appeared on Sixty Minutes II, CBS Evening News and Good Morning America. His work has been featured on four PBS specials and the ABC Australia documentary "Redesign My Brain" (which aired on Discovery Channel as "Hack My Brain" in the United States.)

He holds nearly 100 US patents.

Federal grants Federal grant awards Michael Merzenich leading researcher Year Grant abstract Citation Recipient organization Granted by Amount Inflationary conversion 2005–2006 Brain plasticity based training for focal dystonia Posit Science Corporation NICHD $195,727 $2001–2005 Auditory and somatosensory cortex Javits grant UCSF NINDS $1,662,734 $ 2005 Brain plasticity based training for Schizophrenia Fast-Track proposal Posit Science Corporation NIMH $139,811 $ 2005 Brain plasticity rehabilitaton of visual cognition Posit Science Corporation NEI $97,350 $ 1996–2000 Functional organization of auditory somatosensory cortex UCSF NINDS $1,245,234 $ 1992–1995 Design Of Pediatric Cochlear Implants UCSF NIDCD $1,097,866 $ 1981–1995Functional Organization Of The Central Auditory System UCSF NINDS $1,324,202 $ 1987 Sensory Disorders And Language Study Section U.S. PHS PUBLIC ADVISORY GROUPS CSR – – 1987 Scala Tympani Electrode Arrays UCSF NINDS – – 1977–1980 Development Of An Acoustic Prosthesis UCSF NINDS – – 1980–1982 Develop Electrodes For Auditory Prosthesis UCSF NINDS – – 1975–1980 Functional Organization Of The Auditory System UCSF NINDS – – 1977–1980 Develop Multichannel Electrodes For Auditory Prosthesis UCSF NINDS – – 1972–1974 Studies On Organization Of Central Auditory System UCSF NINDS – –

Patents and inventions Merzenich holds nearly 100 U.S. patents. Along with Peter B. Delahunt, Joseph L. Hardy, Henry W. Mahncke, and Donald Richards hold the patent for visual emphasis for cognitive training exercises. This patent explores a computer system of visual learning. The participant observes a scene which shows at least one foreground object against a background. The background or foreground are modified to enhance the participants response to achieve a correct response in an iterative basis.

Published works Merzenich has contributed to over 232 publications.

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