Hubel, David

Born in Winsor ( Ontario ) in a family from Detroit , who moved to Montreal in 1929 . ^[5] His father, Jesse H. Hubel , was a chemical engineer; mother, Elsie M. Hunter ( Elsie M. Hunter Hubel ), is a housewife. His grandfather, a native of Bavaria, Frederick A. Hubel , was also a chemist, one of the inventors of gelatin capsules and how to cut them for the pharmaceutical industry. ^{[6] [7]} He studied at the Strathcona Academy in Otremont (1932-1944), then at McGill University . Since 1954 he lived in the USA.

David Hubel and Thorsten Wiesel using the technique of registering individual units (neuron cells) investigated the reaction of individual neurons in the visual zone of the cerebral cortex . The experiment allowed us to determine the relationship of certain neurons in the visual zone of the cerebral cortex with a specific location of the visual field. This shows that the individual neurons of the visual cortex are responsible for the stimuli reflected by a specific receptor zone, in this experiment a certain area of ​​the retina ^[8]

Most of the individual cells of the visual cortex - trait detectors - are active when exposed to receptors of such stimuli located in a certain area of ​​the receptor zone of the retina, such as oriented linear segments, the thickness of linear segments, and the light-dark border configuration. Thalamic neurons are an input for cell-detector traits. Neurons - feature detectors corresponding, for example, to a specific orientation of a linear segment in a specific area of ​​the visual field, are the input to complex neurons. In the visual cortex, one can distinguish hierarchical structures of neurons into which they are combined: neurons - feature detectors, complex neurons and hypercomplex neurons. The response to complex complex stimuli requires a transition to a higher level of visual cortical neurons from detectors to complex and further hypercomplex neurons. Hypercomplex neurons respond to specific, complex shapes specific to each hypercomplex neuron, regardless of their location in the visual field. ^[9]

In his Nobel speech, Hubel described an experiment in which various receptive fields of the primary visual cortex were discovered:

“Our first real discovery happened unexpectedly. For two or three hours we did not succeed. Then, gradually, we began to distinguish between some vague and inconsistent responses when stimulated somewhere on the border between the center and the periphery of the retina. We just inserted a slide on the glass in the form of a dark spot into the ophthalmoscope connector, when suddenly, through an audio monitor, the cell charged like a machine gun. After some time, after a little panic, we found out what happened. Of course, the signal had nothing to do with the dark spot. While we inserted the slide on the glass, its edge cast a faint but clear shadow on the retina, in the form of a straight dark line against a light background. This was exactly what the cell wanted, and, moreover, she wanted this line to have a strictly defined orientation. It was unheard of. Now it’s even hard to think and imagine how far we were from any idea as to what role cortex cells can play in the normal life of an animal. ” ^[ten]

Wrote the book "Eye, brain, vision."

• 1972 - Rosenstyle Prize
• 1978 - Louise Gross Horwitz Award
• 1979 - Weizmann Memorial Lectures
• 1980 - Dixon Prize
• 1981 - Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine
• 1993 -
• 1996 - Schrödinger Lecture (Imperial College London)
• 2006 - Introduced into the ^[11]

• Information on the Nobel website