The Human Frontier Science Program Organization granted the 2012 HFSP Nakasone Award to Prof. Gina Turrigiano (BIOL) "for introducing the concept of ‘synaptic scaling,'" according to a HFSP press release.

Turrigiano will travel to the Republic of Korea in July 2012 to give the Nakasone Lecture at the annual meeting of HFSP awardees, according to the press release.

The HFSP, founded in 1989, supports international research and training in the life sciences.

The Nakasone Award, which is named after former Prime Minister Nakasone of Japan who created the HFSP, was "established to [honor] scientists who have made key breakthroughs in fields at the forefront of the life sciences," according to the press release.

Turrigiano's research was focused around a process called "synaptic scaling."

"Your brain is the most complex machine in the universe. Amazingly, unlike, say, your car, it is capable of tuning itself up so that most of the time it will continue to work reliably," explained Turrigiano in an email to the Justice. "A number of years ago we discovered an important mechanism that allows our brains to do this, dubbed ‘synaptic scaling.'"

"We found that individual neurons can sense whether their activity is appropriate, and if not can ‘scale' their synaptic inputs up or down to bring their activity back into the correct range. Synaptic scaling works to keep the activity in our brains from becoming imbalanced, which otherwise would lead to states like epilepsy or catatonia," wrote Turrigiano.

Dean of Arts and Sciences Susan Birren, who served on the Life Sciences faculty with Turrigiano, wrote in an email to the Justice that Turrigiano's research is "outstanding."

"Turrigiano's research has provided groundbreaking new insight into a fundamental problem in neurobiology the question of how the brain can maintain appropriate activity levels in the face of dramatic changes in nerve cell growth that take place during development and during learning," wrote Birren in an email to the Justice.

Birren also acknowledged the international aspect of the award. "The award is given by the Human Frontier Science Program, an organization that facilitates research between scientists from different nations. … Thus, in many ways, the award highlights our role as a global liberal arts research university," wrote Birren.

Turrigiano said that her research is important because "synaptic scaling" and other forms of plasticity are "turning out to be critical for the function of many kinds of brain circuits, and many many labs are now working on synaptic scaling and other so-called ‘homeostatic' mechanisms to generate insight into disorders as diverse as autism and Alzheimer's disease," explained Turrigiano.

Turrigiano wrote that she would like to share the credit for her work with her collaborator, Prof. Sacha Nelson (BIOL) and all the members of her lab. "This kind of recognition is always really nice, but mostly we do our work because we just want to understand how the brain works, and because we know this understanding will be important down the road for understanding many brain disorders," concluded Turrigiano.