Baycrest scientist wins prestigious Gairdner Award

Baycrest held a special evening tribute on Oct. 20 th for one of its most preeminent senior scientists, Dr. Endel Tulving, who received one of the world's highest scientific honours this year – a 2005 Gairdner International Award.

“The Gairdners” recognize outstanding contributions by medical scientists worldwide whose work will significantly improve the quality of life. Many recipients have gone on to win the Nobel Prize.

Dr. Tulving, a cognitive psychologist with Baycrest's Rotman Research Institute, and the Anne and Max Tannebaum Joint Chair in Cognitive Neuroscience at Baycrest and the University of Toronto, is internationally recognized for his landmark research to distinguish different types of human memory.

In 1972, Dr. Tulving proposed a basic distinction between two kinds of memory – episodic and semantic. According to his work, episodic memory is used to recall events we have personally experienced or witnessed. Semantic memory taps into our mental storage of general facts and knowledge (e.g. Ottawa is the capital of Canada ).

“Dr. Tulving's research has extremely important implications for the study of both normal memory as well as memory breakdown due to brain damage and aging,” said Stephen W. Herbert, president and CEO of Baycrest, speaking at the tribute.

“What could be more important for an organization whose mission is to transform aging through a special focus on brain functioning. Dr. Tulving, we are honoured to have you as a member of our team and we are delighted that you have received this outstanding recognition.”

During the 1960s when most research focused on how memories are acquired and stored, Dr. Tulving was the first to contend that science should be paying more attention to the equally important function of how memories are retrieved – that is, how stored information is accessed . He argued that the key difficulty in human memory is retrieval of information, and he has devoted much of his career to examining the factors that affect this retrieval.

“The presence of Professor Tulving was a magical elixir in creating the reputation of excellence at Baycrest's Rotman Research Institute,” said institute director Dr. Donald Stuss, recalling when Dr. Tulving joined the Rotman Institute in 1992.

In addition to his research work in Toronto , Dr. Tulving is also the Clark Way Harrison Distinguished Visiting Professor of Psychology and Cognitive Neuroscience in Arts & Sciences at Washington University in St. Louis .

Other honours
Other honours for Dr. Endel Tulving include emeritus professor at the University of Toronto; the Distinguished Scientific Contribution Award from the American Psychological Association (1983); Guggenheim Fellowship (1987); National Academy of Sciences (1988); Fellow, Royal Society of London (1992); Gold Medal Award for Life Achievement in Psychological Science from the American Psychological Foundation (1994); and the McGovern Award from the American Association for the Advancement of Science (1996).