Roger Wolcott Sperry (1913–1994)
Abstract
Roger Wolcott Sperry
studied the function of the nervous system in the US during the
twentieth century. He studied split-brain patterns in cats and
humans that result from separating the two hemispheres of the
brain by cutting the corpus callosum, the bridge between the two
hemispheres of the brain. He found that separating the corpus
callosum the two hemispheres of the brain could not communicate
and they performed functions as if the other hemisphere did not
exist. Sperry studied optic nerve regeneration through which he
developed the chemoaffinity hypothesis. The chemoaffinity
hypothesis stated that axons, the long fiber-like process of
neurons, connect to their target cells through special chemical
markers. This challenged the previously accepted resonance
principle of neuronal connection. Sperry shared the 1981 Nobel
Prize in Physiology or Medicine with David Hubel and Torsten
Wiesel.