The selection committee for Brandeis' Jay Pepose '75 Award in Vision Sciences awarded Dorothy W. Poitras Professor in Medical Engineering and Medical Physics of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology Peter Schiller, said Prof. John Lisman (BIOL) in an interview with the Justice. The Pepose Award, which recognizes contributions to the understanding of vision, was established in 2009 by a $1 million gift made to the University from alumnus Jay Pepose '75 and his wife, Susan K. Feigenbaum '74, according to a BrandeisNOW press release.

Lisman and a committee that consisted of Prof. Robert Sekuler (PSYC), Prof. Daniel Oprian (BCHM), Prof. Sacha Nelson (BIOL) and Dr. Joseph Rizzo, a neuro-opthalmologist at Massachusetts General Hospital, selected Schiller about a year ago to win the award, said Lisman. Lisman also said that the Pepose Award was granted to Schiller based on his research achievements throughout his career.

For example, Schiller was one of the first people who designed an experiment to help "bridge the gap between understanding neurons and neurotransmitters, which are relatively simple structures, [and] . understand how their interaction actually functions to promote human behaviors like recognition or perception," said Lisman.

Lisman described Schiller's research as "a dramatic breakthrough in terms of being able to span the gap between simple cellular and neurotransmitter properties and actual behavior of the organism."

Additionally, Lisman credited Schiller with training "an incredible number of scientists" who have become leaders in the field of neuroscience. "He was really a father figure for a very large component of neuroscience," said Lisman.

"It is a tremendous honor; I am very pleased, and I am excited to be able to give a presentation about the research I have been doing," he said in an interview with the Justice.

Schiller also recognized that the award could have an impact on his future research. "There is little doubt that awards are something that improve your recognition worldwide, . and that certainly also helps, which is very important nowadays, in trying to secure funds to carry out your basic research," he said.

Schiller is scheduled to receive the award and speak about his research on March 14 at 4 p.m. in Gerstenzang 121. Schiller will deliver a lecture titled "Parallel Information Processing Channels Created in the Retina."

According to Schiller, in his lecture he will speak about research that "examines the organization of the retina and how there are several very traumatically different kinds of retinal ganglion cells that analyze different aspects of the visual scene."

Schiller will also speak as a guest lecturer in Lisman's "Systems Neuroscience" class on March 15, discussing "the neural mechanisms of eye movement control and the various pathways that are involved in various aspects of eye movement control," he said.

Schiller is also involved in several other lines of vision research, such as depth perception and how humans can see a third dimension to determine distance.

Lisman noted that Pepose, who donated the money to establish the award, worked in Lisman's laboratory as an undergraduate at Brandeis in the field of vision research. After Brandeis, Pepose founded and became the medical director of the Pepose Vision Institute in St. Louis, according to BrandeisNOW.

Pepose is also a professor of clinical ophthalmology at Washington University in St. Louis.

This is the second year the Pepose Award has been granted.

Last year, the committee granted the Pepose Award to Jay and Maureen Neitz who, according to BrandeisNOW, are researchers at the University of Washington. according to BrandeisNOW.