Professor Semir Zeki

Semir Zekiobtained his Ph.D. in anatomy from University College in London (UCL), followed by post-doctoral research in the United States. Over the next three decades, he pursued a distinguished career in neurobiology, and became a Professor of Neurobiology at UCL in 1981. Zeki is a Fellow of the prestigious Royal Society (London), foreign member of the American Philosophical Society, Fellow of the Academy of Medical Sciences (London), and member of the European Academy of Sciences and Arts and the Academia Europaea. He is also a member of the Scientific Board of Governors at the Scripps Research Institute.

Professor Zeki’s lifetime contributions are centered on the organization of the visual cortex in humans and other primates. One of his earlier keynote findings was the discovery that specific areas of the visual cortex engage in segregated responses to either color vision or visual motion stimulation, and that color and visual motion are perceived at different times. He described how colors are represented in the visual cortex and how that region uses color-coded cells to process color images. From the wealth of information that he gathered over several years on vision and motion pathways, Zeki formulated an overall theory of visual consciousness in which he proposed that the visual brain contains several, parallel and functionally specialized processing areas. Subsequently, he developed a novel psychophysical technique which showed that the cortical regions processing a visual stimulus are also involved in its perception. This cutting-edge discovery provided the basis for his revolutionary concept that consciousness is not a unity, but an assembly of numerous micro consciousnesses distributed both in time and space. He is studying how these visual micro consciousnesses are integrated to produce a unified perception of the visual scene.

Professor Zeki’s seminal contributions to the biology of vision were recognized by numerous other prizes, invited lectureships, and membership of learned societies and editorial boards. He authored or co-authored some 180 papers and four books. His main interest outside his work lies on learning more about art and creativity as manifestations of brain activity and this has led him to engage with artists and write about their work; for instance, his books Inner Vision, which has been translated into 6 languages, and La Quête de l’essentiel – jointly with the late French painter Balthus – as well as articles about Dante, Michelangelo and Wagner). This has also led him to establish the Institute of Neuroaesthetics in Berkeley, CA in 2001.

This biography was written in the year the prize was awarded.