Patricia Goldman-Rakic - Contributions To Science

Contributions To Science

Goldman-Rakic was the first to discover and describe the circuitry of the prefrontal cortex and its relationship to working memory. Before Goldman-Rakic, scientists thought that the higher cognitive functions of the prefrontal cortex were beyond the scope of scientific study. Goldman-Rakic's research showed that methods employed to study the sensory cortices could be adapted to the highest order prefrontal cortical areas, revealing the circuit basis for higher cognitive function. Because of Goldman-Rakic, scientists began to better understand the neurobiological basis of higher cognitive function, and of such disorders as schizophrenia, Alzheimer's, A.D.H.D., cerebral palsy, Parkinson's, and dementia. She used a multidisciplinary approach, applying biochemical, electrophysiological, pharmacological, anatomical and behavioral techniques to study working memory. She pioneered the first studies of dopamine influences on prefrontal cortical function, research that is critical to our understanding of schizophrenia, A.D.H.D. and Parkinson's Disease. A review of her life's work, including her special role mentoring women scientists, can be found in the journal Neuron. Goldman-Rakic is also the founder of the Cerebral Cortex Journal, a specialized publication by Oxford Press.

Goldman-Rakic is credited with having the first detailed structure and function of the brain's frontal lobe. Amy Arnsten describes Goldman-Rakic's first major discovery thus: "Pat injected tritiated amino acids into the sulcus principals and found stunning results: patches of input in striatum (the very first description of the patch/matrix organization of this structure) and columns of input in the contralateral P.F.C." After this at the National Institute of Mental Health, Goldman-Rakic assembled a multidisciplinary team (in itself a pioneering move) and proceeded to map "the exquisite order and structure of this brain region Goldman-Rakic broke down gender barriers in her field and made a name in a scientific world where women were not expected to succeed Goldman-Rakic became chief of a laboratory section at the National Institute of Health in a time when few women rose to senior levels. Goldman-Rakic was an author and collaborator on hundreds of papers and she also won numbers honors and awards. Among them: The Karl Lashley Award from the American Philosophical Society, the Distinguished Scientific Contribution Award from the American Psychological Association, and a Merit Award from NIH She was also the first woman honored by the Max Planck Institute for Psychiatry with its Emil Kraepelin Professor für Psychiatrie Award. Goldman-Rakic concentrated much research on what she called "working memory," describing it as the "blackboard of the mind" or "online memory" For many years, the frontal lobe was considered inaccessible to rigorous exploration. Goldman-Rakic's focus was an in-depth elaboration of the workings of the frontal lobe from single cells to…how cells communicated with each other to how primates behaved This was all part of her work and part of what made her a pioneer. Goldman-Rakic's research and discoveries with the prefrontal cortex spread throughout the area of schizophrenia research. According to Amy Arnsten Goldman-Rakic single-handedly elevated it from phenomenology and speculation, to an understanding of basic mechanisms of disease. Goldman-Rakic was not alone in attributing an important role in working memory to the frontal lobes, an area of the neocortex largely expanded in primates but she was, however, rare in her unwavering belief that the key to understanding something as complex as working memory lies in understanding the interactions of multiple elements found in this cortical region Studies she did in the 1970s demonstrated that the loss of dopamine in the prefrontal cortex led to severe disruptions in working memory, a profound discovery for neuropsychiatry Those studies helped with the understanding of how drugs were used to treat the symptoms of a broad range of mental illnesses. She developed intricate and delicate procedures for placing minute lesions into the prefrontal cortex to explore how the lesions affected the animals’ learning and memory functions A quick search on Medline will document the magnitude of Goldman-Rakic's influence on neuroscience In the 16 years before the publication of her seminal 1987 paper on prefrontal cortical circuitry and function, only 628 papers were published on prefrontal cortex. In the 16 years since 1987, there have been over 6,800 I think this substantial increase in the number of published works just goes one step further to explain why her colleagues call her a pioneer of her field. She led the way for women as well as other neurobiologists into a field that was previously thought of as untouchable. Goldman-Rakic was not alone in attributing an important role in working memory to the frontal lobes, an area of the neocortex largely expanded in primates but she was, however, rare in her unwavering belief that the key to understanding something as complex as working memory lies in understanding the interactions of multiple elements found in this cortical region Studies she did in the 1970s demonstrated that the loss of dopamine in the prefrontal cortex led to severe disruptions in working memory, a profound discovery for neuropsychiatry. Those studies helped with the understanding of how drugs were used to treat the symptoms of a broad range of mental illnesses.