2006 Farrell Prize recipient: Mircea Steriade, MD, DSc

Mircea Steriade, MD, DSc
Professor of Neuroscience
University Laval, Quebec, Canada
(1924-2006)

Awarded in celebration of the work and life of Mircea Steriade, daring and indefatigable explorer of brain oscillations during sleep.

• Keen observer and masterful interpreter of the interplay of neurons’ rhythmic dances of activity, with tempo and timing shaped by changes in state.
• Conqueror of the challenge of intracellular recording in the intact brain, creator of a lucid, revolutionary explication of spindles and the underlying orchestration of thalamic and cortical neuronal activity.
• Master of neuronal sleep rhythms, creator of a unifying theory that grouped spindles, delta activity, and fast oscillations under the organizing baton of a slow
  neocortical oscillation.
• Illuminator of REM sleep-generating and EEG-activation properties of cholinergic brainstem nuclei.
• Gifted neurologist who translated his insight into brain oscillations during sleep into understanding of seizure generation. 

Harvard Medical School
Division of Sleep Medicine
2006