Suzana Herculano-Houzel

Suzana Herculano-Houzel (born 1972) is a Brazilian neuroscientist. Her main field of work is comparative neuroanatomy; her findings include a method of counting neurons in human and other animals' brains[1] and the relation between the cerebral cortex area and the thickness and number of cortical folds.[2]

Suzana Herculano-Houzel
Born
Suzana Carvalho Herculano

1972 (age 51–52)
Alma materCase Western Reserve University
Pierre and Marie Curie University
Max Planck Institute
Federal University of Rio de Janeiro
Scientific career
FieldsNeuroscience
InstitutionsVanderbilt University

Career

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Suzana Herculano-Houzel was born in 1972 in Rio de Janeiro. She graduated in biology at the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro (1992), took a master's degree at Case Western Reserve (1995), and a doctorate in neuroscience at Paris VI University (1999). She was also a post-doctoral fellow at the Max Planck Institute for Brain Research.

Herculano-Houzel was a faculty member at the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro from 2002 to May 2016, when she moved to Vanderbilt University.[3]

She published books on popularization of science and writes columns for Folha de S.Paulo newspaper and Scientific American Brazil magazine. She was the first Brazilian speaker on TED Global in 2013.[4][5]

She won the José Reis Prize for Science Communication in 2004.

Personal life

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Herculano-Houzel was diagnosed with autism as an adult.[6]

See also

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Publications

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  • Human Advantage: A New Understanding of How Our Brain Became Remarkable. Editor: The Mit Press; (2016). ISBN 0262034255

References

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  1. ^ Herculano-Houzel, Suzana; Lent, Roberto (9 March 2005). "Isotropic Fractionator: A Simple, Rapid Method for the Quantification of Total Cell and Neuron Numbers in the Brain". The Journal of Neuroscience. 25 (10): 2518–2521. doi:10.1523/JNEUROSCI.4526-04.2005. PMC 6725175. PMID 15758160.
  2. ^ Herculano-Houzel, Suzana; Mota, Bruno (3 July 2015). "Cortical folding scales universally with surface area and thickness, not number of neurons". Science. 349 (6243): 74–77. doi:10.1126/science.aaa9101. PMID 26138976.
  3. ^ "Neurocientista Suzana Herculano-Houzel deixa o país" [Neuroscientist Suzana Herculano-Houzel leaves the country]. piauí (in Portuguese). Archived from the original on 2016-05-03.
  4. ^ "A mulher que encolheu o cérebro humano". O Globo (in Portuguese). Rio de Janeiro. 24 May 2013. Retrieved 25 August 2015.
  5. ^ Herculano-Houzel, Suzana. "What is so Special about the human brain?". TED. Retrieved 25 August 2015.
  6. ^ Lopes, Reinaldo José (23 July 2023). "'Parem de tentar consertar a gente', diz Suzana Herculano-Houzel sobre espectro autista". Folha de S.Paulo (in Portuguese). Retrieved 4 May 2024.
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