2022 Karl Spencer Lashley Award

The 2022 recipient of the Karl Spencer Lashley Award is Nicholas Spitzer, Atkinson Family Chair, Distinguished Professor, and Vice Chair, University of California, San Diego, “in recognition of his discovery of neurotransmitter switching in single neurons of adult mammals, and his demonstration of causal links between neurotransmitter switching and behavioral state.”  The 2022 Lashley Award was presented at the Society's November 2022 Meeting.

Nick Spitzer discovered neurotransmitter switching in adult mammals in response to sustained environmental stimuli or sustained stress.  Switches typically replace an excitatory transmitter with an inhibitory one or vice versa, and postsynaptic receptors change to match the newly expressed transmitter.  In elegant experiments, Professor Spitzer showed that transmitter switches are linked to changes in behavioral state, playing a critical regulating role in behaviors as diverse as motor skill learning, behavioral responses to changes in day length, and behavioral expression of fear.  Neurotransmitter switching is a novel form of neuroplasticity that may lie at the root of numerous long-term behavioral changes.

The Karl Spencer Lashley Award was established in 1957 by a gift from Dr. Lashley, a member of the Society and a distinguished neuroscientist and neuropsychologist.  His entire scientific life was spent in the study of behavior and its neural basis.  Dr. Lashley’s famous experiments on the brain mechanisms of learning, memory and intelligence helped inaugurate the modern era of integrative neuroscience, and the Lashley Award recognizes innovative work that continues exploration in the field.

The members of the selection committee are William T. Newsome III (chair), Harman Family Provostial Professor, Vincent V. C. Woo Director of the Stanford Neurosciences Institute, Professor of Neurobiology and, by courtesy, of Psychology, Stanford University; John E. Dowling, Gordon and Llura Gund Research Professor of Neurosciences Emeritus, Harvard University; Catherine Dulac, Higgins Professor of Molecular and Cellular Biology, Lee and Ezpeleta Professor of Arts and Sciences, Harvard University, and Investigator for Howard Hughes Medical Institute; Ann M. Graybiel, Institute Professor, Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences, Investigator, McGovern Institute for Brain Research, Massachusetts Institute of Technology; John G. Hildebrand, Regents Professor of Neuroscience, University of Arizona; Eric Knudsen, Sewell Professor of Neurobiology Emeritus, Stanford University School of Medicine; Edvard Moser, Professor of Neuroscience, Director, Kavli Institute for Systems Neuroscience, Norwegian University of Science and Technology; and Larry R. Squire, Distinguished Professor of Psychiatry, Neurosciences, and Psychology, University of California, San Diego, Research Career Scientist, Veterans Affairs Medical Center, San Diego.