Outreach

fiat scientia: bringing spikes to the Society of Neuroscience and Eric Kandel

The annual Society for Neuroscience meeting is a big event for us; we prepare all year working on new prototypes and experiments for annual review by our colleagues, friends, and academic foes. This year was a special treat, as we were recognized for our outreach efforts by the Society itself, represented by President Michael Goldburg.

Copyright (c) 2010, Society for Neuroscience. All rights reserved. Photo by Jeff Nyveen.

Copyright (c) 2010, Society for Neuroscience. All rights reserved. Photo by Jeff Nyveen.

The highlight of this conference for us, of indeed all the conferences we’ve been to, was meeting the second most famous Neuroscientist ever. Yes, none other than Nobel LaureateEric Kandel. When we saw him at the beginning of the Presidential lecture, making rounds and shaking hands with the other famous neuroscientists, we snuck up behind him and slowly turned up the speaker on our SpikerBox. When he turned around, we said,”Sorry to interrupt you, Professor Kandel, but we were just wondering if you’ve ever seen neurons before.” He didn’t skip a beat; he saw the real-time spikes on the iPad, and said “My, those are beautiful! Spikes at Neuroscience! You’re the ones who should be giving the presidential lecture!” He touched the cockroach leg to see if he could evoke a neural response, and he was convinced. We then sat down. Thanks Professor! We’ll keep working hard! Props also to Jeff Nyveen, photographer for the meeting, for quickly grabbing the shots for us.

Copyright (c) 2010, Society for Neuroscience. All rights reserved. Photo by Jeff Nyveen.

Copyright (c) 2010, Society for Neuroscience. All rights reserved. Photo by Jeff Nyveen.