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Vilayanur Subramanian Ramachandran (born 10 August 1951) is an
Indian-American Indian Americans or Indo-Americans are citizens of the United States with ancestry from India. The United States Census Bureau uses the term Asian Indian to avoid confusion with Native Americans, who have also historically been referred to ...
neuroscientist A neuroscientist (or neurobiologist) is a scientist who has specialised knowledge in neuroscience, a branch of biology that deals with the physiology, biochemistry, psychology, anatomy and molecular biology of neurons, Biological neural network, n ...
. He is known for his wide-ranging experiments and theories in behavioral neurology, including the invention of the
mirror box Mirror therapy (MT) or mirror visual feedback (MVF) is a therapy for pain or disability that affects one side of the patient more than the other side. It was invented by Vilayanur S. Ramachandran to treat post-amputation patients who had phantom ...
. Ramachandran is a distinguished professor in
UCSD The University of California, San Diego (UC San Diego or colloquially, UCSD) is a public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in San Diego, California. Established in 1960 near the pre-existing Scripps Insti ...
's Department of Psychology, where he is the director of the Center for Brain and Cognition. After earning a medical degree in India, Ramachandran studied experimental neuroscience at
Cambridge Cambridge ( ) is a university city and the county town in Cambridgeshire, England. It is located on the River Cam approximately north of London. As of the 2021 United Kingdom census, the population of Cambridge was 145,700. Cambridge bec ...
, obtaining his PhD there in 1978. Most of his research has been in the fields of
behavioral neurology Behavioral neurology is a subspecialty of neurology that studies the impact of neurological damage and disease upon behavior, memory, and cognition, and the treatment thereof. Two fields associated with behavioral neurology are neuropsychiatry and ...
and visual
psychophysics Psychophysics quantitatively investigates the relationship between physical stimuli and the sensations and perceptions they produce. Psychophysics has been described as "the scientific study of the relation between stimulus and sensation" or, m ...
. After early work on human vision, Ramachandran turned to work on wider aspects of neurology including
phantom limbs A phantom limb is the sensation that an amputated or missing limb is still attached. Approximately 80 to 100% of individuals with an amputation experience sensations in their amputated limb. However, only a small percentage will experience painf ...
and
phantom pain Phantom pain is a perception that an individual experiences relating to a limb or an organ that is not physically part of the body, either because it was removed or was never there in the first place. However, phantom limb sensations can also oc ...
. Ramachandran invented
mirror therapy Mirror therapy (MT) or mirror visual feedback (MVF) is a therapy for pain or disability that affects one side of the patient more than the other side. It was invented by Vilayanur S. Ramachandran to treat post-amputation patients who had phantom ...
which is now used to treat amputees with phantom limb pain and also to help restore motor control in stroke victims with weakened limbs. Ramachandran's popular books ''
Phantoms in the Brain ''Phantoms in the Brain: Probing the Mysteries of the Human Mind'' (also published as ''Phantoms in the Brain: Human Nature and the Architecture of the Mind'') is a 1998 popular science book by neuroscientist V.S. Ramachandran and ''New York Time ...
'' (1998), ''
The Tell-Tale Brain ''The Tell-Tale Brain: A Neuroscientist's Quest for What Makes Us Human'' is a 2010 nonfiction book by V. S. Ramachandran that explores, from a neurological viewpoint, the uniqueness of human nature. Synopsis Ramachandran discusses seven main c ...
'' (2010), and others describe neurological and clinical studies of people with
synesthesia Synesthesia (American English) or synaesthesia (British English) is a perceptual phenomenon in which stimulation of one sensory or cognitive pathway leads to involuntary experiences in a second sensory or cognitive pathway. People who re ...
,
Capgras syndrome Capgras delusion or Capgras syndrome is a psychiatric disorder in which a person holds a delusion that a friend, spouse, parent, or other close family member (or pet) has been replaced by an identical impostor. It is named after Joseph Capgras (1 ...
, and a wide range of other unusual conditions. Ramachandran has also described his work in many public lectures, including lectures for the BBC, and two official
TED talks TED Conferences, LLC (Technology, Entertainment, Design) is an American-Canadian non-profit media organization that posts international talks online for free distribution under the slogan "ideas worth spreading". TED was founded by Richard Sau ...
. Both his scientific research and his popularization of science have been recognized with multiple awards.


Biography

Ramachandran was born in 1951 in
Tamil Nadu Tamil Nadu (; , TN) is a States and union territories of India, state in southern India. It is the List of states and union territories of India by area, tenth largest Indian state by area and the List of states and union territories of India ...
,
India India, officially the Republic of India (Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area, the second-most populous country, and the most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the so ...
. His mother had a degree in mathematics. His grandfather was
Alladi Krishnaswamy Iyer Dewan Bahadur Sir Alladi Krishnaswamy Iyer (14 May 1883 – 3 October 1953) was an Indian lawyer and member of the Constituent Assembly of India, which was responsible for framing the Constitution of India. He also served as the advocate genera ...
, one of the framers of India's constitution. Ramachandran's father, V. M. Subramanian, was an engineer who worked for the
U.N. The United Nations (UN) is an intergovernmental organization whose stated purposes are to maintain international peace and security, develop friendly relations among nations, achieve international cooperation, and be a centre for harmonizin ...
Industrial Development Organization and served as a diplomat in
Bangkok Bangkok, officially known in Thai language, Thai as Krung Thep Maha Nakhon and colloquially as Krung Thep, is the capital and most populous city of Thailand. The city occupies in the Chao Phraya River delta in central Thailand and has an estima ...
,
Thailand Thailand ( ), historically known as Siam () and officially the Kingdom of Thailand, is a country in Southeast Asia, located at the centre of the Indochinese Peninsula, spanning , with a population of almost 70 million. The country is bo ...
. Ramachandran attended schools in
Madras Chennai (, ), formerly known as Madras ( the official name until 1996), is the capital city of Tamil Nadu, the southernmost Indian state. The largest city of the state in area and population, Chennai is located on the Coromandel Coast of th ...
, and British schools in
Bangkok Bangkok, officially known in Thai language, Thai as Krung Thep Maha Nakhon and colloquially as Krung Thep, is the capital and most populous city of Thailand. The city occupies in the Chao Phraya River delta in central Thailand and has an estima ...
. Ramachandran, whose father wanted him to become a physician rather than a researcher, obtained an
M.B.B.S. Bachelor of Medicine, Bachelor of Surgery ( la, Medicinae Baccalaureus, Baccalaureus Chirurgiae; abbreviated most commonly MBBS), is the primary medical degree awarded by medical schools in countries that follow the tradition of the United King ...
from
Stanley Medical College Stanley Medical College (SMC) is a government medical college with hospitals located in Chennai, Tamil Nadu, India. Though the original hospital is more than 200 years old, the medical college was formally established on 2 July 1938. The medic ...
in
Chennai Chennai (, ), formerly known as Madras ( the official name until 1996), is the capital city of Tamil Nadu, the southernmost Indian state. The largest city of the state in area and population, Chennai is located on the Coromandel Coast of th ...
, India. In 1978, Ramachandran obtained a Ph.D. from
Trinity College Trinity College may refer to: Australia * Trinity Anglican College, an Anglican coeducational primary and secondary school in , New South Wales * Trinity Catholic College, Auburn, a coeducational school in the inner-western suburbs of Sydney, New ...
at the
University of Cambridge , mottoeng = Literal: From here, light and sacred draughts. Non literal: From this place, we gain enlightenment and precious knowledge. , established = , other_name = The Chancellor, Masters and Schola ...
. Later he moved to the US, where he spent two years at
Caltech The California Institute of Technology (branded as Caltech or CIT)The university itself only spells its short form as "Caltech"; the institution considers other spellings such a"Cal Tech" and "CalTech" incorrect. The institute is also occasional ...
as a research fellow working with
Jack Pettigrew John Douglas "Jack" Pettigrew (2 October 1943''Who's Who in Australia 2013'', Crown Content, 2012. - 7 May 2019) was an Australian neuroscientist. He was Emeritus Professor of Physiology and Director of the Vision, Touch and Hearing Research ...
before being appointed assistant professor of psychology at the
University of California, San Diego The University of California, San Diego (UC San Diego or colloquially, UCSD) is a public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in San Diego, California. Established in 1960 near the pre-existing Scripps Insti ...
in 1983. He became a full professor there in 1998. He currently holds the rank of distinguished professor in the UCSD Psychology Department, and is the director of its Center for Brain and Cognition, where he works with graduate students and researchers from UCSD and elsewhere on emerging theories in neuroscience. As of July 2019, Ramachandran is also a professor in the UCSD Medical School's Neurosciences program. and an adjunct professor at the
Salk Institute for Biological Studies The Salk Institute for Biological Studies is a scientific research institute located in the La Jolla community of San Diego, California, U.S. The independent, non-profit institute was founded in 1960 by Jonas Salk, the developer of the polio vacci ...
. In 1987, Ramachandran married a fellow-scientist who became his frequent co-author as Diane Rogers-Ramachandran. They have two sons. Ramachandran's scientific work can be divided into two phases. From the early 1970s until the late 1980s, Ramachandran's work focused almost exclusively on human visual processing, especially on
stereopsis Stereopsis () is the component of depth perception retrieved through binocular vision. Stereopsis is not the only contributor to depth perception, but it is a major one. Binocular vision happens because each eye receives a different image becaus ...
. Ramachandran began publishing research in this area beginning in 1972, with a paper in ''Nature'' while still a student at Stanley Medical College. In 1991, Ramachandran was inspired by Tim Pons's research on cortical plasticity. Pons demonstrated cortical reorganization in monkeys after the amputation of a finger. Ramachandran was one of the first researchers to recognize the potential of neuroimaging technology to demonstrate the plastic changes that take place in the human cortex after amputation. Ramachandran then began research on
phantom limb A phantom limb is the sensation that an amputated or missing limb is still attached. Approximately 80 to 100% of individuals with an amputation experience sensations in their amputated limb. However, only a small percentage will experience painf ...
s, but later moved on to study a wider range of neurological mysteries, including
body integrity identity disorder Body integrity dysphoria (BID, also referred to as body integrity identity disorder, amputee identity disorder and xenomelia, formerly called apotemnophilia) is a mental disorder characterized by a desire to have a sensory or physical disabili ...
and the
Capgras delusion Capgras delusion or Capgras syndrome is a psychiatric disorder in which a person holds a delusion that a friend, spouse, parent, or other close family member (or pet) has been replaced by an identical impostor. It is named after Joseph Capgras (1 ...
. Ramachandran has encountered skepticism about some of his theories. Ramachandran has responded, "I have—for better or worse—roamed the whole landscape of visual perception, stereopsis, phantom limbs, denial of paralysis, Capgras syndrome, synaesthesia, and many others." Ramachandran has served as a consultant in areas such as forensic psychology and the neuroscience of weight reduction. In 2007, Ramachandran served as an
expert witness An expert witness, particularly in common law countries such as the United Kingdom, Australia, and the United States, is a person whose opinion by virtue of education, training, certification, skills or experience, is accepted by the judge as ...
on
pseudocyesis False pregnancy (or pseudocyesis, from the Greek "false" and "pregnancy") is the appearance of clinical or subclinical signs and symptoms associated with pregnancy although the individual is not physically carrying a baby. The mistaken impressi ...
(false pregnancy) at the trial of
Lisa M. Montgomery Bobbie Jo Stinnett (December 4, 1981 – December 16, 2004) was an American 23-year-old Pregnancy, pregnant woman who was murdered in Skidmore, Missouri, Skidmore, Missouri in December 2004. The perpetrator, Lisa Marie Montgomery, then aged 36-y ...
. Ramachandran has served as a consultant to the Modius company which is developing weight reduction technology that relies on electrically stimulating parts of the brain that control weight loss. Ramachandran is collaborating with Indian doctors doing research on
Mucuna pruriens ''Mucuna pruriens'' is a tropical legume native to Africa and tropical Asia and widely naturalized and cultivated. Its English common names include monkey tamarind, velvet bean, Bengal velvet bean, Florida velvet bean, Mauritius velvet bean, Yo ...
, an
ayurvedic Ayurveda () is an alternative medicine system with historical roots in the Indian subcontinent. The theory and practice of Ayurveda is pseudoscientific. Ayurveda is heavily practiced in India and Nepal, where around 80% of the population rep ...
(Indian natural medicine) therapy for Parkinson's disease. In his scientific work, Ramachandran often uses simple equipment, such as mirrors or old-fashioned
stereoscope A stereoscope is a device for viewing a stereoscopic pair of separate images, depicting left-eye and right-eye views of the same scene, as a single three-dimensional image. A typical stereoscope provides each eye with a lens that makes the ima ...
s, rather than complex brain imaging technologies such as fMRI. Ramachandran has been outspoken about his intuition-based approach to studying the brain. In an interview with ''Frontline'' magazine Ramachandran stated:
Intuition is what gets you started; then you need empirical studies... brain-imaging technology often lulls you into a false sense of having understood what's going on. So sometimes, not having technology - that's my own approach and that of some of my colleagues, we use it only when it's absolutely essential, just like medical diagnostics. We rely more on intuition in doing simple experiments, because if you rely on fancy medical imaging, you become less creative.


Research and theory


Phantom limbs

When an arm or leg is amputated, patients often continue to feel vividly the presence of the missing limb as a "phantom limb" (an average of 80%). Building on earlier work by
Ronald Melzack Ronald Melzack (July 19, 1929 – December 22, 2019) was a Canadian psychologist and professor of psychology at McGill University. In 1965, he and Patrick David Wall revolutionized pain research by introducing the gate control theory of pain. ...
(McGill University) and Timothy Pons (NIMH), Ramachandran theorized that there was a link between the phenomenon of phantom limbs and
neural plasticity Neuroplasticity, also known as neural plasticity, or brain plasticity, is the ability of neural networks in the brain to change through growth and reorganization. It is when the brain is rewired to function in some way that differs from how it ...
in the adult
human brain The human brain is the central organ of the human nervous system, and with the spinal cord makes up the central nervous system. The brain consists of the cerebrum, the brainstem and the cerebellum. It controls most of the activities of the ...
. To test this theory, Ramachandran recruited amputees, so that he could learn more about if phantom limbs could "feel" a stimulus to other parts of the body. In 1992, in collaboration with T.T. Yang, S. Gallen, and others at the Scripps Research Institute who were conducting
MEG Meg is a feminine given name, often a short form of Megatron, Megan, Megumi (Japanese), etc. It may refer to: People *Meg (singer), a Japanese singer *Meg Cabot (born 1967), American author of romantic and paranormal fiction *Meg Burton Cahill ( ...
research, Ramachandran initiated a project to demonstrate that there had been measurable changes in the somatosensory cortex of a patient who had undergone an arm amputation. Ramachandran theorized that there was a relationship between the cortical reorganization evident in the MEG image and the non-painful referred sensations he had observed in other subjects. Later researchers found that non-painful phantom limbs correlated less with motor or somatosensory plasticity than painful phantom limbs. Recent research has also shown that the peripheral nervous system is involved in painful phantom limb phenomena. Research continues into more precise mechanisms and explanations.


Mirror visual feedback/mirror therapy

Writing in 2009,
John Colapinto John Colapinto (born in 1958) is a Canadian journalist, author and novelist and a staff writer at ''The New Yorker''. In 2000, he wrote the ''New York Times'' bestseller '' As Nature Made Him: The Boy Who Was Raised as a Girl'', which exposed ...
(author of Ramachandran's profile in
The New Yorker ''The New Yorker'' is an American weekly magazine featuring journalism, commentary, criticism, essays, fiction, satire, cartoons, and poetry. Founded as a weekly in 1925, the magazine is published 47 times annually, with five of these issues ...
) said that
mirror box Mirror therapy (MT) or mirror visual feedback (MVF) is a therapy for pain or disability that affects one side of the patient more than the other side. It was invented by Vilayanur S. Ramachandran to treat post-amputation patients who had phantom ...
therapy for amputees was Ramachandran's most noted achievement. Ramachandran thought that
phantom pain Phantom pain is a perception that an individual experiences relating to a limb or an organ that is not physically part of the body, either because it was removed or was never there in the first place. However, phantom limb sensations can also oc ...
might be caused by the mismatch between different parts of an amputee's nervous systems: the
visual system The visual system comprises the sensory organ (the eye) and parts of the central nervous system (the retina containing photoreceptor cells, the optic nerve, the optic tract and the visual cortex) which gives organisms the sense of sight (the a ...
says the limb is missing, but the
somatosensory system In physiology, the somatosensory system is the network of neural structures in the brain and body that produce the perception of touch (haptic perception), as well as temperature (thermoception), body position (proprioception), and pain. It ...
(processing body sensations such as touch and limb position) says the limb is still there. The so-called mirror box was a simple apparatus that uses a mirror reflecting an amputee's good arm so it appears to be the extension of the one missing:
They put their surviving arm through a hole in the side of a box with a mirror inside, so that, peering through the open top, they would see their arm and its mirror image, as if they had two arms. Ramachandran then asked them to move both their intact arm and, in their mind, their phantom arm—to pretend that they were conducting an orchestra, say. The patients had the sense that they had two arms again.
Ramachandran found that in some cases restoring movement to a paralyzed phantom limb reduced the pain experienced. In 1999 Ramachandran and Eric Altschuler expanded the mirror technique from amputees to improving the muscle control of stroke patients with weakened limbs. As Deconick et al. state in a 2014 review, the mechanism of improved motor control may differ from the mechanism of pain relief. Despite the introduction of mirror therapy in the late 1990s, little research was published on it before 2009, and much of the research since then has been of contested quality. Out of 115 publications between 2012 and 2017 about using mirror therapy to treat phantom limb pain, a 2018 review, found only 15 studies whose scientific results should be considered. From these 15 studies, the reviewers concluded that "MT seems to be effective in relieving PLP, reducing the intensity and duration of daily pain episodes. It is a valid, simple, and inexpensive treatment for PLP." Similarly, a 2017 review that studied a wider range of uses for mirror therapy, concluded, "Mirror therapy has been used to treat phantom limb pain, complex regional pain syndrome, neuropathy and low back pain. The mechanism of action of mirror therapy remains uncertain, and the evidence for clinical efficacy of mirror therapy is encouraging, but not yet definitive."


Mirror neurons

Mirror neurons were first reported in a paper published in 1992 by a team of researchers led by
Giacomo Rizzolatti Giacomo Rizzolatti (born 28 April 1937) is an Italian neurophysiologist who works at the University of Parma. Born in Kyiv, UkSSR, he is the Senior Scientist of the research team that discovered mirror neurons in the frontal and parietal cortex ...
at the
University of Parma The University of Parma ( it, Università degli Studi di Parma, UNIPR) is a public university in Parma, Emilia-Romagna, Italy. It is organised in nine departments. As of 2016 the University of Parma has about 26,000 students. History During the ...
. According to Rizzolati, "Mirror neurons are a specific type of visuomotor neuron that discharge both when a monkey executes a motor act and when it observes a similar motor act performed by another individual." In 2000, Ramachandran made what he called some "purely speculative conjectures" that "mirror neurons
n humans N, or n, is the fourteenth letter in the Latin alphabet, used in the modern English alphabet, the alphabets of other western European languages and others worldwide. Its name in English is ''en'' (pronounced ), plural ''ens''. History ...
will do for psychology what DNA did for biology: they will provide a unifying framework and help explain a host of mental abilities that have hitherto remained mysterious and inaccessible to experiments." Ramachandran has suggested that research into the role of mirror neurons could help explain a variety of human mental capacities such as empathy, imitation learning, and the evolution of language. In a 2001 essay for ''Edge'', Ramachandran speculated that
I suggested that in addition to providing a neural substrate for figuring out another persons intentions...the emergence and subsequent sophistication of mirror neurons in hominids may have played a crucial role in many quintessentially human abilities such as empathy, learning through imitation (rather than trial and error), and the rapid transmission of what we call "culture". (And the "great leap forward" — the rapid Lamarckian transmission of "accidental") one-of-a kind inventions.
Ramchandran's speculations about the connection of mirror neurons with empathy have been contested by some authors and supported by others.Baron-Cohen, Making Sense of the Brain's Mysteries, American Scientist, On-line Book Review, July–August 201

/ref>


"Broken Mirrors" theory of autism

In 1999, Ramachandran, in collaboration with then post-doctoral fellow Eric Altschuler and colleague Jaime Pineda, hypothesized that a dysfunction of
mirror neuron A mirror neuron is a neuron that fires both when an animal acts and when the animal observes the same action performed by another. Thus, the neuron "mirrors" the behavior of the other, as though the observer were itself acting. Such neurons hav ...
activity might be responsible for some of the symptoms and signs of autism spectrum disorders. Between 2000 and 2006 Ramachandran and his colleagues at UC San Diego published a number of articles in support of this theory, which became known as the "Broken Mirrors" theory of autism. Ramachandran and his colleagues did not measure mirror neuron activity directly; rather they demonstrated that children with ASD showed abnormal EEG responses (known as
Mu wave The sensorimotor mu rhythm, also known as mu wave, comb or wicket rhythms or arciform rhythms, are synchronized patterns of electrical activity involving large numbers of neurons, probably of the pyramidal type, in the part of the brain that c ...
suppression) when they observed the activities of other people. In ''
The Tell-Tale Brain ''The Tell-Tale Brain: A Neuroscientist's Quest for What Makes Us Human'' is a 2010 nonfiction book by V. S. Ramachandran that explores, from a neurological viewpoint, the uniqueness of human nature. Synopsis Ramachandran discusses seven main c ...
'' (2010), Ramachandran states that the evidence for mirror-neuron dysfunction in autism is "compelling but not conclusive." The contention that mirror neurons play a role in autism has been extensively discussed and researched.


Neural basis of synesthesia

Ramachandran was one of the first scientists to theorize that grapheme-color synesthesia arises from a cross-activation between brain regions. Ramachandran and his graduate student, Ed Hubbard, conducted research with
functional magnetic resonance imaging Functional magnetic resonance imaging or functional MRI (fMRI) measures brain activity by detecting changes associated with blood flow. This technique relies on the fact that cerebral blood flow and neuronal activation are coupled. When an area o ...
that found increased activity in the color recognition areas of the brain in synesthetes compared to non-synesthetes. Ramachandran has speculated that conceptual metaphors may also have a neurological basis in cortical cross-activation. As of 2015, the neurological basis of synesthesia had not been established.


Xenomelia (Apotemnophilia)

In 2008, Ramachandran, along with David Brang and Paul McGeoch, published the first paper to theorize that
apotemnophilia Body integrity dysphoria (BID, also referred to as body integrity identity disorder, amputee identity disorder and xenomelia, formerly called apotemnophilia) is a mental disorder characterized by a desire to have a sensory or physical disabili ...
is a neurological disorder caused by damage to the right
parietal lobe The parietal lobe is one of the four major lobes of the cerebral cortex in the brain of mammals. The parietal lobe is positioned above the temporal lobe and behind the frontal lobe and central sulcus. The parietal lobe integrates sensory informa ...
of the brain. This rare disorder, in which a person desires the amputation of a limb, was first identified by
John Money John William Money (8 July 1921 – 7 July 2006) was a New Zealand psychologist, sexologist and author known for his research into sexual identity and Sex determination and differentiation (human), biology of gender. He was one of the first ...
in 1977. Building on medical case studies that linked brain damage to syndromes such as
somatoparaphrenia Somatoparaphrenia is a type of monothematic delusion where one denies ownership of a limb or an entire side of one's body. Even if provided with undeniable proof that the limb belongs to and is attached to their own body, the patient produces elab ...
(lack of limb ownership) the authors speculated that the desire for amputation could be related to changes in the right parietal lobe. In 2011 McGeoch, Brang and Ramachandran reported a functional imaging experiment involving four subjects who desired lower limb amputations. MEG scans demonstrated that their right superior parietal lobules were significantly less active in response to tactile stimulation of a limb that the subjects wished to have amputated, as compared to age/sex matched controls. The authors introduced the word "Xenomelia" to describe this syndrome, which is derived from the Greek for "foreign" and "limb".


Popularization of science

Ramachandran is the author of several popular books on neurology such as ''
Phantoms in the Brain ''Phantoms in the Brain: Probing the Mysteries of the Human Mind'' (also published as ''Phantoms in the Brain: Human Nature and the Architecture of the Mind'') is a 1998 popular science book by neuroscientist V.S. Ramachandran and ''New York Time ...
'' (1998) and ''
The Tell-Tale Brain ''The Tell-Tale Brain: A Neuroscientist's Quest for What Makes Us Human'' is a 2010 nonfiction book by V. S. Ramachandran that explores, from a neurological viewpoint, the uniqueness of human nature. Synopsis Ramachandran discusses seven main c ...
'' (2010). ''Phantoms in the Brain'' became the basis for a 2001 PBS
Nova A nova (plural novae or novas) is a transient astronomical event that causes the sudden appearance of a bright, apparently "new" star (hence the name "nova", which is Latin for "new") that slowly fades over weeks or months. Causes of the dramati ...
special. In 2003, the BBC chose Ramachandran to deliver that year's
Reith Lectures The Reith Lectures is a series of annual BBC radio lectures given by leading figures of the day. They are commissioned by the BBC and broadcast on Radio 4 and the World Service. The lectures were inaugurated in 1948 to mark the historic contribu ...
, a series of radio lectures. Ramachandran's five radio talks on the topic "The Emerging Mind" were afterward published as a book with the same title. Ramachandran has also given many talks, including
TED talks TED Conferences, LLC (Technology, Entertainment, Design) is an American-Canadian non-profit media organization that posts international talks online for free distribution under the slogan "ideas worth spreading". TED was founded by Richard Sau ...
in 2007 and 2010. In 1997, ''Newsweek'' included him on a list of one hundred "personalities whose creativity or talent or brains or leadership will make a difference in the years ahead." In 2008, ''Foreign Policy'' included Ramachandran as one of its "World’s Top 100 Public Intellectuals." Similarly, in 2011, ''Time'' listed Ramachandran as one of "the most influential people in the world" on the "Time 100 list". Both the ''Time'' and the ''Prospect'' selections were decided by public voting on a longer list of names proposed by the organization.


Awards and honors

Ramachandran has received many academic and other honors. For example, from his biography at Edge.org:
In 2005 he was awarded the Henry Dale Medal and elected to an honorary life membership by the
Royal Institution The Royal Institution of Great Britain (often the Royal Institution, Ri or RI) is an organisation for scientific education and research, based in the City of Westminster. It was founded in 1799 by the leading British scientists of the age, inc ...
of Great Britain, where he also gave a Friday evening discourse (joining the ranks of Michael Faraday, Thomas Huxley, Humphry Davy and others.) His other honours and awards include fellowships from
All Souls College All Souls College (official name: College of the Souls of All the Faithful Departed) is a constituent college of the University of Oxford in England. Unique to All Souls, all of its members automatically become fellows (i.e., full members of t ...
, Oxford, and from Stanford University (Hilgard Visiting Professor); the Presidential Lecture Award from the American Academy of Neurology, two honorary doctorates, the annual Ramon y Cajal award from the International Neuropsychiatry Society, and the Ariens Kappers medal from the
Royal Netherlands Academy of Sciences The Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences ( nl, Koninklijke Nederlandse Akademie van Wetenschappen, abbreviated: KNAW) is an organization dedicated to the advancement of science and literature in the Netherlands. The academy is housed ...
.
In 2007, the president of India conferred on him the third highest civilian award and honorific title in India, the
Padma Bhushan The Padma Bhushan is the third-highest civilian award in the Republic of India, preceded by the Bharat Ratna and the Padma Vibhushan and followed by the Padma Shri. Instituted on 2 January 1954, the award is given for "distinguished service ...
. In 2014, the
ARCS Foundation ARCS® Foundation, Inc. (Achievement Rewards for College Scientists) is an American nonprofit volunteer women's organization that promotes US competitiveness by providing financial awards to academically outstanding US citizens studying to complete ...
(Achievement Rewards for College Scientists) named Ramachandran its "Scientist of the Year."


Books written

* '' Phantoms in the Brain: Probing the Mysteries of the Human Mind'', coauthor
Sandra Blakeslee Sandra Blakeslee (born 1943) is an American science correspondent of over four decades for ''The New York Times'' and science writer, specializing in neuroscience. Together with neuroscientist V. S. Ramachandran, she authored the 1998 popular sci ...
, 1998 (). * ''Encyclopedia of the Human Brain'' (editor-in-chief), three volumes, 2002 (). * ''The Emerging Mind'', 2003 (). * ''A Brief Tour of Human Consciousness: From Impostor Poodles to Purple Numbers'', 2005 (; paperback edition). * '' The Tell-Tale Brain: A Neuroscientist's Quest for What Makes Us Human'', 2010 (). * ''The Encyclopedia of Human Behavior'' (editor-in-chief), four-volume second edition, 2012 ().


See also

*
Body image Body image is a person's thoughts, feelings and perception of the aesthetics or sexual attractiveness of their own body. The concept of body image is used in a number of disciplines, including neuroscience, psychology, medicine, psychiatry, ps ...
*
Oliver Sacks Oliver Wolf Sacks, (9 July 1933 – 30 August 2015) was a British neurologist, naturalist, historian of science, and writer. Born in Britain, Sacks received his medical degree in 1958 from The Queen's College, Oxford, before moving to the Uni ...
*
Phantom limb A phantom limb is the sensation that an amputated or missing limb is still attached. Approximately 80 to 100% of individuals with an amputation experience sensations in their amputated limb. However, only a small percentage will experience painf ...
*
Phantom pain Phantom pain is a perception that an individual experiences relating to a limb or an organ that is not physically part of the body, either because it was removed or was never there in the first place. However, phantom limb sensations can also oc ...
*
Synesthesia Synesthesia (American English) or synaesthesia (British English) is a perceptual phenomenon in which stimulation of one sensory or cognitive pathway leads to involuntary experiences in a second sensory or cognitive pathway. People who re ...
*
Sound symbolism In linguistics, sound symbolism is the resemblance between sound and meaning. It is a form of linguistic iconicity. For example, the English word ''ding'' may sound similar to the actual sound of a bell. Linguistic sound may be perceived as simil ...
(phonaesthesia) *
Temporal lobe epilepsy Temporal lobe epilepsy (TLE) is a chronic disorder of the nervous system which is characterized by recurrent, unprovoked focal seizures that originate in the temporal lobe of the brain and last about one or two minutes. TLE is the most common f ...


References


External links


Vilayanur S. Ramachandran (official webpage)

TED Talks by Ramachandran

Reith lectures by Ramachandran, BBC website
; {{DEFAULTSORT:Ramachandran, V. S. 1951 births 20th-century Indian medical doctors Alumni of Trinity College, Cambridge American academics of Indian descent American people of Indian Tamil descent Autism researchers Cognitive neuroscientists Columbia University staff Fellows of the Society of Experimental Psychologists Harvard University staff Indian emigrants to the United States Indian neuroscientists Living people Neurotheology Recipients of the Padma Bhushan in science & engineering Medical doctors from Tamil Nadu Stanford University Department of Psychology faculty University of California, San Diego faculty University of Madras alumni Salk Institute for Biological Studies people Indian American American people of Indian descent