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Mr. David E. O'Gorman wins the Helen Carr Peake Research
Prize for 2006
Ms. Radha Kalluri and Ms. Jocelyn E. Songer receive
Honorable Mention
For Immediate Release
MONDAY, 24 April 2006
Contact: William Smith, Assistant
Director for Finance and Sponsor Relations
Phone: +1.617.253.5621
Email: whs@mit.edu
CAMBRIDGE, MA. 04.24.2006
The Research Laboratory of Electronics (RLE) at the
Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) announces
that Mr. David E. O'Gorman has won the Helen Carr Peake
Research Prize for 2006. In addition, Ms. Radha Kalluri
and Ms. Jocelyn E. Songer will receive Honorable Mention
recognition.
All three are doctoral students in the Speech and
Hearing Bioscience and Technology Program of the Harvard-MIT
Division of Health Sciences and Technology (HST), and
all three conduct research at RLE's affiliated Eaton-Peabody
Laboratory (EPL), an inter-institutional research center
of the Massachusetts Eye and Ear Infirmary (MEEI),
Harvard Medical School (HMS), Massachusetts General
Hospital (MGH), and MIT.
Mr. O'Gorman's research has been supervised by Dr.
Christopher Shera, Associate Professor of Otology and
Laryngology at HMS. Mr. O'Gorman has identified and
solved a fundamental, and largely unrecognized, problem
in the cochlear implant field: the biophysical basis
for the irregular firing patterns of auditory neurons
that are driven by high-rate electrical stimulation.
Mr. O'Gorman's work, presented at the 2006 Midwinter
Meeting of the Association for Research in Otolaryngology
and appears in an article to be submitted to the Journal
of Neuroscience, has the potential for important applications
to stimulus-encoding algorithms for cochlear implants.
Ms. Kalluri is also being supervised by Professor
Shera. Her research rigorously tests existing models
for the origin of otoacoustic emissions (OAEs). Ms.
Songer's research is being supervised by Dr. John J.
Rosowski, Professor of Otology and Laryngology and
Health Sciences and Technology at HMS and a former
principal investigator in RLE. Her research deals with
the consequences of a newly-described inner-ear pathology
in which there is a hole in the bone that normally
covers the superior semi-circular canal.
The Helen Carr Peake Research Prize was established
through a donation of Dr. Sheldon Pang, an alumnus
of RLE and EPL. It consists of an annual award of $2000
to an MIT student for bioengineering research performed
in either RLE or EPL. This year is the fourth time
the prize is being awarded, and only the second time
that Honorable Mentions have been made. The prize presentation
to Mr. O'Gorman and recognition of the Honorable Mentions
for Ms. Kalluri and Ms. Songer will occur later this
spring at an award luncheon.
The selection of Mr. O'Gorman, Ms. Kalluri, and Ms.
Songer was done by a committee consisting of Professor
Dennis M. Freeman (MIT/RLE), Professor
Jeffrey H. Shapiro (MIT, Director RLE), Professor M. Charles Liberman
(HMS, Director EPL), Professor
William T. Peake (MIT/RLE/EPL)
and Professor
John L. Wyatt (MIT/RLE).
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