Skip to main content
  • Home
  • About
  • Faculty Experts
  • For The Media
  • ’Cuse Conversations Podcast
  • Topics
    • Alumni
    • Events
    • Faculty
    • Students
    • All Topics
  • Contact
  • Submit
STEM
  • All News
  • Arts & Culture
  • Business & Economy
  • Campus & Community
  • Health & Society
  • Media, Law & Policy
  • STEM
  • Veterans
  • University Statements
  • Syracuse University Impact
  • |
  • The Peel
  • Athletics
Sections
  • All News
  • Arts & Culture
  • Business & Economy
  • Campus & Community
  • Health & Society
  • Media, Law & Policy
  • STEM
  • Veterans
  • University Statements
  • Syracuse University Impact
  • |
  • The Peel
  • Athletics
  • Home
  • About
  • Faculty Experts
  • For The Media
  • ’Cuse Conversations Podcast
  • Topics
    • Alumni
    • Events
    • Faculty
    • Students
    • All Topics
  • Contact
  • Submit
STEM

Stanford’s Carla Shatz to Deliver Kameshwar C. Wali Lecture Dec. 8

Wednesday, November 23, 2016, By Rob Enslin
Share
College of Arts and SciencesEventsSyracuse Symposium

Syracuse Symposium continues its yearlong look at “Place” with a visit by world-renowned neurobiologist Carla Shatz.

Carla Shatz

Carla Shatz

A professor of biology and neurobiology at Stanford University, Shatz will deliver this year’s Kameshwar C. Wali Lecture in the Sciences and Humanities titled “Inside the Brain: Synapses Lost and Found in Development and Alzheimer’s Disease.” The lecture is Thursday, Dec. 8, at 4 p.m. in 132 Lyman Hall. The following day at noon she will lead a scientific research seminar in Watson Theater.

Both events are free and open to the public. For more information, contact the Department of Physics in the College of Arts and Sciences at 315.443.3901.

Shatz’s visit is co-sponsored by the Kameshwar C. Wali Lecture in the Sciences and Humanities Fund, the physics department, the Interdisciplinary Neuroscience Studies Program and the Syracuse University Humanities Center, all based in A&S.

Syracuse Symposium is organized and presented by the Humanities Center.

“In addressing questions of development, memory and immunity, Carla’s research enhances our understanding of human nature,” says Vivian May, director of the Humanities Center and professor of women’s and gender studies. “She illustrates how our brains are like plastic, inviting us to think of the brain as a ‘place’ of its own and as something that interacts with wider contexts and experiences. Her study of brain-environment interaction provides an important glimpse into how our bodies ward off neurodegenerative disease.”

May adds that Shatz’s work exemplifies the interdisciplinary nature of the liberal arts: “As a Wali lecturer, she will encourage us to think collectively about complex problems, traversing the boundaries of scientific, humanistic and social science inquiry.”

Carla Shatz

Shatz celebrates her Kavli prize with members of her Stanford lab. (Linda A. Cicero/Stanford News Service)

Cristina Marchetti, the William R. Kenan Distinguished Professor of Physics in A&S, says both presentations will address Shatz’s contributions to understanding how brain wiring occurs during development—research for which she was awarded the prestigious Kavli Neuroscience Prize in June.

Particular emphasis will be placed on the part of the brain that receives information from the eyes.

“Using the visual system as her primary model of brain development, Carla has discovered universal mechanisms that determine which young synapses get strengthened and which ones are pruned to create adult brain wiring. She has confirmed that neurons activated simultaneously often form stable connections,” says Marchetti, alluding to Shatz’s favorite quote, “Cells that fire together, wire together.”

Shatz also will talk about her discovery of proteins that may be manipulated to help the brain and nervous system fight neurological ailments, such as autism, schizophrenia, Alzheimer’s and Lou Gehrig’s disease.

“Carla will describe her laboratory’s groundbreaking discovery, in which molecules once thought to function only in the immune system, are present in the brain and regulate this [synaptic] pruning,” says Sandra Hewett, the Beverly Petterson Bishop Professor of Neuroscience in A&S. “Research shows that blocking the function of these molecules reopens a critical period for vision in the adult brain. This leads to the intriguing idea that manipulating these molecules after brain damage may help retrain brain circuits or help people with Alzheimer’s learn and remember better.”

Committed to shattering glass ceilings, Shatz is the first woman to have earned a Ph.D. in neurobiology from Harvard Medical School and to have chaired that university’s Department of Neurobiology. At Stanford, she was the first woman hired by the School of Medicine and then awarded tenure in the basic sciences.

In addition to Stanford and Harvard, Shatz has taught at the University of California, Berkeley. In 2007, she returned to Palo Alto, where she has since served as the inaugural Sapp Family Provostial Professor and the David Starr Jordan Director of Stanford Bio-X, a pioneering interdisciplinary biosciences institute.

Kameshwar C. Wali

Kameshwar C. Wali

The lecture’s namesake, Kameshwar C. Wali, is the Steele Professor of Physics Emeritus. A Syracuse faculty member since 1969, he is internationally recognized for his research into the symmetry properties of fundamental particles and their interactions. Wali is the author of “Cremona Violins: A Physicist’s Quest for the Secrets of Stradivari” (World Scientific, 2010) and “Chandra: A Biography of S. Chandrasekhar” (University of Chicago Press, 1991). He is a fellow of the American Physical Society, whose India Chapter named him Scientist of the Year, and a recipient of the Chancellor’s Citation at Syracuse for exceptional academic achievement.

  • Author

Rob Enslin

  • Recent
  • WiSE Hosts the 2025 Norma Slepecky Memorial Lecture and Undergraduate Research Prize Award Ceremony
    Friday, June 13, 2025, By News Staff
  • Inaugural Meredith Professor Faculty Fellows Announced
    Friday, June 13, 2025, By Wendy S. Loughlin
  • Lab THRIVE: Advancing Student Mental Health and Resilience
    Thursday, June 12, 2025, By News Staff
  • 7 New Representatives Added to the Board of Trustees
    Wednesday, June 11, 2025, By News Staff
  • Whitman Honors Outstanding Alumni and Friends at 2025 Awards and Appreciation Event
    Tuesday, June 10, 2025, By News Staff

More In STEM

WiSE Hosts the 2025 Norma Slepecky Memorial Lecture and Undergraduate Research Prize Award Ceremony

This spring, Women in Science and Engineering (WiSE) held its annual Norma Slepecky Memorial Lecture and Award Ceremony. WiSE was honored to host distinguished guest speaker Joan-Emma Shea, who presented “Self-Assembly of the Tau Protein: Computational Insights Into Neurodegeneration.” Shea…

Endowed Professorship Recognizes Impact of a Professor, Mentor and Advisor

Bao-Ding “Bob” Cheng’s journey to Syracuse University in pursuit of graduate education in the 1960s was long and arduous. He didn’t have the means for air travel, so he voyaged more than 5,000 nautical miles by boat from his home…

Forecasting the Future With Fossils

One of the most critical issues facing the scientific world, no less the future of humanity, is climate change. Unlocking information to help understand and mitigate the impact of a warming planet is a complex puzzle that requires interdisciplinary input…

ECS Professor Pankaj K. Jha Receives NSF Grant to Develop Quantum Technology

Detecting single photons—the smallest unit of light—is crucial for advanced quantum technologies such as optical quantum computing, communication and ultra-sensitive imaging. Superconducting nanowire single-photon detectors (SNSPDs) are the most efficient means of detecting single photons and these detectors can count…

Rock Record Illuminates Oxygen History

Several key moments in Earth’s history help us humans answer the question, “How did we get here?” These moments also shed light on the question, “Where are we going?,” offering scientists deeper insight into how organisms adapt to physical and…

Subscribe to SU Today

If you need help with your subscription, contact sunews@syr.edu.

Connect With Us

  • X
  • Facebook
  • Instagram
  • Youtube
  • LinkedIn
Social Media Directory

For the Media

Find an Expert Follow @SyracuseUNews
  • Facebook
  • Instagram
  • Youtube
  • LinkedIn
  • @SyracuseU
  • @SyracuseUNews
  • Social Media Directory
  • Accessibility
  • Privacy
  • Campus Status
  • Syracuse.edu
© 2025 Syracuse University News. All Rights Reserved.