Mark Firman Bear is an American neuroscientist. He is currently the Picower Professor of Neuroscience in The Picower Institute for Learning and Memory at

Massachusetts Institute of Technology The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) is a private land-grant research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Established in 1861, MIT has played a key role in the development of modern technology and science, and is one of the ...

. He is a former Howard Hughes Medical Institute Investigator; an Elected Fellow of the

American Association for the Advancement of Science The American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) is an American international non-profit organization with the stated goals of promoting cooperation among scientists, defending scientific freedom, encouraging scientific respons ...

American Academy of Arts and Sciences The American Academy of Arts and Sciences (abbreviation: AAA&S) is one of the oldest learned societies in the United States. It was founded in 1780 during the American Revolution by John Adams, John Hancock, James Bowdoin, Andrew Oliver, and ...

American College of Neuropsychopharmacology Founded in 1961, the American College of Neuropsychopharmacology (ACNP) is a professional organization of leading brain and behavior scientists. The principal functions of the college are research and education. Their goals in research are to offe ...

; and a Member of the National Academy of Medicine.

Education

Bear earned a B.S. degree from

Duke University Duke University is a private research university in Durham, North Carolina. Founded by Methodists and Quakers in the present-day city of Trinity in 1838, the school moved to Durham in 1892. In 1924, tobacco and electric power industrialist James ...

and his Ph.D. in neurobiology at

Brown University Brown University is a private research university in Providence, Rhode Island. Brown is the seventh-oldest institution of higher education in the United States, founded in 1764 as the College in the English Colony of Rhode Island and Providenc ...

Career

Until 2003, Bear was the Sidney A. and Dorothy Doctors Fox Professor at Brown University's

Alpert Medical School The Warren Alpert Medical School (formerly known as Brown Medical School, previously known as Brown University School of Medicine) is the medical school of Brown University, located in Providence, Rhode Island. Originally established in 1811, it ...

. Bear's research focuses on understanding developmental plasticity in the visual cortex and experience-dependent synaptic modification in

visual cortex The visual cortex of the brain is the area of the cerebral cortex that processes visual information. It is located in the occipital lobe. Sensory input originating from the eyes travels through the lateral geniculate nucleus in the thalamus and ...

and

hippocampus The hippocampus (via Latin from Greek , 'seahorse') is a major component of the brain of humans and other vertebrates. Humans and other mammals have two hippocampi, one in each side of the brain. The hippocampus is part of the limbic system, a ...

. He has described novel forms of

procedural learning Procedural memory is a type of implicit memory (unconscious, long-term memory) which aids the performance of particular types of tasks without conscious awareness of these previous experiences. Procedural memory guides the processes we perform, ...

in the visual system, and investigated synaptic function in models of

fragile X syndrome Fragile X syndrome (FXS) is a genetic disorder characterized by mild-to-moderate intellectual disability. The average IQ in males with FXS is under 55, while about two thirds of affected females are intellectually disabled. Physical features may ...

and other autism spectrum disorders

Selected publications

* Bear, Mark F., Barry W. Connors, and Michael A. Paradiso, eds. Neuroscience. Vol. 2. Lippincott Williams & Wilkins, 2007. * Malenka, Robert C., and Mark F. Bear. "LTP and LTD: an embarrassment of riches." Neuron 44.1 (2004): 5-21. * Bear, Mark F., Kimberly M. Huber, and Stephen T. Warren. "The mGluR theory of fragile X mental retardation." Trends in neurosciences 27.7 (2004): 370–377. * Abraham, Wickliffe C., and Mark F. Bear. "Metaplasticity: the plasticity of synaptic plasticity." Trends in neurosciences 19.4 (1996): 126–130. * Bear, Mark F., and Robert C. Malenka. "Synaptic plasticity: LTP and LTD." Current Opinion in Neurobiology 4.3 (1994): 389–399. * Dudek, Serena M., and Mark F. Bear. "Homosynaptic long-term depression in area CA1 of hippocampus and effects of N-methyl-D-aspartate receptor blockade." Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 89.10 (1992): 4363–4367. * Bear, Mark F., and Wolf Singer. "Modulation of visual cortical plasticity by acetylcholine and noradrenaline." (1986): 172–176.

References

External links

* Year of birth missing (living people) Living people Massachusetts Institute of Technology School of Science faculty American neuroscientists Duke University alumni Brown University alumni Fellows of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences Fellows of the American Association for the Advancement of Science Members of the National Academy of Medicine {{US-biologist-stub