Michael Kaplan (biologist)
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Michael S. Kaplan (born January 3, 1952) is an American
biology Biology is the scientific study of life and living organisms. It is a broad natural science that encompasses a wide range of fields and unifying principles that explain the structure, function, growth, History of life, origin, evolution, and ...
researcher Research is creative and systematic work undertaken to increase the stock of knowledge. It involves the collection, organization, and analysis of evidence to increase understanding of a topic, characterized by a particular attentiveness to ...
, medical
professor Professor (commonly abbreviated as Prof.) is an Academy, academic rank at university, universities and other tertiary education, post-secondary education and research institutions in most countries. Literally, ''professor'' derives from Latin ...
, and clinical
physician A physician, medical practitioner (British English), medical doctor, or simply doctor is a health professional who practices medicine, which is concerned with promoting, maintaining or restoring health through the Medical education, study, Med ...
. A pioneer of
neurogenesis Neurogenesis is the process by which nervous system cells, the neurons, are produced by neural stem cells (NSCs). This occurs in all species of animals except the porifera (sponges) and placozoans. Types of NSCs include neuroepithelial cells ( ...
research, his work refuted the classic idea that no new nerve cells are born in the adult
mammal A mammal () is a vertebrate animal of the Class (biology), class Mammalia (). Mammals are characterised by the presence of milk-producing mammary glands for feeding their young, a broad neocortex region of the brain, fur or hair, and three ...
ian brain. His research using light and electron
microscopy Microscopy is the technical field of using microscopes to view subjects too small to be seen with the naked eye (objects that are not within the resolution range of the normal eye). There are three well-known branches of microscopy: optical mic ...
suggested that neurogenesis occurs in the brain of adult mammals, but his findings were rejected by the scientific community at the time in a field that continues to be contentious. Kaplan has recently begun a
YouTube YouTube is an American social media and online video sharing platform owned by Google. YouTube was founded on February 14, 2005, by Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim who were three former employees of PayPal. Headquartered in ...
channel which offers patient interviews and insights to brain plasticity.


Academic background

Tulane University The Tulane University of Louisiana (commonly referred to as Tulane University) is a private research university in New Orleans, Louisiana, United States. Founded as the Medical College of Louisiana in 1834 by a cohort of medical doctors, it b ...
, BS in
Anatomy Anatomy () is the branch of morphology concerned with the study of the internal structure of organisms and their parts. Anatomy is a branch of natural science that deals with the structural organization of living things. It is an old scien ...
, 1975
Boston University Boston University (BU) is a Private university, private research university in Boston, Massachusetts, United States. BU was founded in 1839 by a group of Boston Methodism, Methodists with its original campus in Newbury (town), Vermont, Newbur ...
,
PhD A Doctor of Philosophy (PhD, DPhil; or ) is a terminal degree that usually denotes the highest level of academic achievement in a given discipline and is awarded following a course of graduate study and original research. The name of the deg ...
in
Neuroscience Neuroscience is the scientific study of the nervous system (the brain, spinal cord, and peripheral nervous system), its functions, and its disorders. It is a multidisciplinary science that combines physiology, anatomy, molecular biology, ...
and Anatomy, 1979
Florida State University Florida State University (FSU or Florida State) is a Public university, public research university in Tallahassee, Florida, United States. It is a senior member of the State University System of Florida and a preeminent university in the s ...
, Post-Doc in Anatomy, 1980
University of New Mexico The University of New Mexico (UNM; ) is a public research university in Albuquerque, New Mexico, United States. Founded in 1889 by the New Mexico Territorial Legislature, it is the state's second oldest university, a flagship university in th ...
, Anatomy department Faculty, 1983
University of Miami The University of Miami (UM, UMiami, Miami, U of M, and The U) is a private university, private research university in Coral Gables, Florida, United States. , the university enrolled 19,852 students in two colleges and ten schools across over ...
, MD, 1987
Johns Hopkins University Medical School The Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine (JHUSOM) is the medical school of Johns Hopkins University, a private research university in Baltimore, Maryland. Established in 1893 following the construction of the Johns Hopkins Hospital, the ...
, Residency in Rehabilitation Medicine, 1990
National Institute of Aging The National Institute on Aging (NIA) is a division of the U.S. National Institutes of Health (NIH), located in Bethesda, Maryland. The NIA itself is headquartered in Baltimore, Maryland. The NIA leads a broad scientific effort to understand ...
, Director of Physical Function and Performance Program, 1991–1992
Johns Hopkins University Medical School,
Anesthesiology Anesthesiology, anaesthesiology or anaesthesia is the medical specialty concerned with the total perioperative medicine, perioperative care of patients before, during and after surgery. It encompasses anesthesia, intensive care medicine, critica ...
and Critical Care Medicine fellows Professor, 2000–2005
University of Maryland Medical School, Professor of Anatomy


Research background

Initial studies that suggested that the adult brain could generate new neurons were largely ignored. In the 1960s
Joseph Altman Joseph Altman (1925 – 2016) was an American biologist who worked in the field of neurobiology. First years Born in Hungary to a Jewish family, he survived The Holocaust and migrated with his family via Germany and Australia to the United Stat ...
and coworkers published a series of papers reporting that some dividing cells in the adult brain survived and differentiated into cells with morphology similar to neurons. They used tritiated
thymidine Thymidine (nucleoside#List of nucleosides and corresponding nucleobases, symbol dT or dThd), also known as deoxythymidine, deoxyribosylthymine, or thymine deoxyriboside, is a pyrimidine nucleoside, deoxynucleoside. Deoxythymidine is the DNA nuc ...
autoradiograph An autoradiograph is an image on an X-ray film or nuclear emulsion produced by the pattern of decay emissions (e.g., beta particles or gamma rays) from a distribution of a radioactive substance. Alternatively, the autoradiograph is also availab ...
y to label the cells. Tritiated thymidine is incorporated into the DNA of dividing cells. They found that the highest density of labeling was in the subventricular zone and in the
dentate gyrus The dentate gyrus (DG) is one of the subfields of the hippocampus, in the hippocampal formation. The hippocampal formation is located in the temporal lobe of the brain, and includes the hippocampus (including CA1 to CA4) subfields, and other su ...
of the
hippocampus The hippocampus (: hippocampi; via Latin from Ancient Greek, Greek , 'seahorse'), also hippocampus proper, is a major component of the brain of humans and many other vertebrates. In the human brain the hippocampus, the dentate gyrus, and the ...
. It was known that the dentate gyrus of the hippocampus is essentially devoid of
glia Glia, also called glial cells (gliocytes) or neuroglia, are non-neuronal cells in the central nervous system (the brain and the spinal cord) and in the peripheral nervous system that do not produce electrical impulses. The neuroglia make up ...
. Therefore, Altman attributed the labeling in this region to the uptake of thymidine by dentate granule cells. However, he could not prove that the adult-generated cells were neurons rather than glia, since no phenotypic markers were available that could be used in conjunction with thymidine autoradiography. The absence of specific markers for neurons and glia and continued skepticism surrounding the novel concept of adult neurogenesis limited further development of the research. In the mid 1970s and the early 1980s, Kaplan and his colleagues reexamined the initial observations using the
electron microscope An electron microscope is a microscope that uses a beam of electrons as a source of illumination. It uses electron optics that are analogous to the glass lenses of an optical light microscope to control the electron beam, for instance focusing it ...
and added substantial confidence that neurogenesis could occur in the adult brain. Combining electron microscopy and tritiated thymidine labeling, they showed that labeled cells in the rat dentate gyrus have ultrastructural characteristics of neurons, such as
dendrite A dendrite (from Ancient Greek language, Greek δένδρον ''déndron'', "tree") or dendron is a branched cytoplasmic process that extends from a nerve cell that propagates the neurotransmission, electrochemical stimulation received from oth ...
s and
synapse In the nervous system, a synapse is a structure that allows a neuron (or nerve cell) to pass an electrical or chemical signal to another neuron or a target effector cell. Synapses can be classified as either chemical or electrical, depending o ...
s. Although they were able to demonstrate this in repeatable studies in primate cortex, most researchers at the time did not consider this to be evidence of significant neurogenesis in adult mammals. In addition, the concept that there may be brain stem cells that could proliferate, migrate, and then differentiate into new neurons had not yet been introduced. It was therefore thought that mature neurons would have to replicate, an idea that most researchers found incredible. Furthermore, the possible relevance of the findings for humans was underestimated because there was no evidence of neurogenesis in primates.


Publications

*Kaplan, Michael S, "Zonisamide Provides Relief of Neuropathic Pain and Promotes Weight Loss:" A Retrospective Study Journal of Pain. *Kaplan, Michael S, Pain Medicine & Management Just the Facts "Rehabilitation Evaluation and Treatment in Patients with Low Back Pain" pp. 325–331, McGraw-Hill, Medical Publishing Division, Wallace, Mark S, & Staats, Peter,(eds). 2005 *Kaplan, MS, Miliman, A, Kaplan, L, "Comparative Clinical Efficacy and Abuse Potential of Oral Long Acting Opioids in a Chronic Pain Outpatient Center, The Journal of Pain, 2004;5 (supp1):75. *Kaplan, MS, "Environmental Complexity Stimulates Visual Cortex Neurogenesis: Death of a Dogma and a Research Career" Trends in Neurosciences, October, 2001, vol 24, No. 10. *Specter, Michael, "The New Yorker" Annals of Science; Rethinking the Brain, How the Songs of Canaries Upset a Fundamental Principle of Science. July 23, 2001. *Kaplan, MS, A Croft, L Cromwell, B Holmes, W. Meeker, T Milus & H Vernon, "Persistent Back Pain Following a Work-Related Injury," Journal of the Neuromusculoskeletal System, Spring, 1993. *Kaplan, MS, R Erhard, C Fadul, C Lewis & H Vernon, "Woman with Diffuse Chronic Pain Syndrome," Journal of the Neuromusculoskeletal System, Summer, 1994. *Kaplan, MS, "Reducing the Risk of Falls Among the Elderly," Correspondence in The New England Journal of Medicine, Volume 332, Number 4: 268, January 26, 1995. *Hendler, NH, Kozikowski, JG, & Kaplan, MS, Thoracic Outlet Syndrome: Comparison of Quantitative Testing with the Clinical Exam (in preparation). *Kaplan, MS, R. Pratley & WJ Hawkins "Holter Monitoring for the Assessment of Silent Cardiac Ischemia in Cerebrovascular Disease," Archives of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation vol 72,: 59–61, 1991. *Anderson, M., MS Kaplan & G. Felsenthal, "Brain Injury Obscured by Chronic Pain," Archives of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation, vol 71: 703–708, 1990. *Kaplan, MS & P. Black, "Resident Physician Council Position Paper Regarding Resident Research," submitted, Archives of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation. *Kaplan, MS & Casey, M., "Aging of Granule and Pyramidal Neurons in the Rodent Hippocampus," in preparation. *Kaplan, MS, "Plasticity After Brain Lesions: `Contemporary Concepts'" Archives of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation, 69: 984–991, 1988. *Kaplan, MS, and L Doss, "Primary Brain Tumors; A Novel Therapy" (in preparation). *Kaplan, MS, McNelly, NA & Hinds, JW, "Population Dynamics of Adult formed Granule Neurons of the Rat Olfactory Bulb," Journal of Comparative Neurology, 239: 117–125, 1985. *Kaplan, MS, "Formation of Neurons in Young and Senescent Animals: An Electron Microscopic and Morphological Analysis," Hope for A New Neurology, vol. 457, 173–192, New York, NY, NY Academy of Sciences, 1985. *Kaplan, MS, & DH Bell, "Mitotic Neuroblasts in the Nine Day Old and Eleven Month Old Rodent Hippocampus," Journal of Neuroscience, No. 6: 1429–1441, 1984. *Kaplan, MS & DH Bell, "Neuronal Proliferation in the Nine Month Old Rodent; Radioautographic Study of Granule Cells in the Hippocampus," Experimental Brain Research, 52: 1–5, 1983. *Kaplan, MS, "Proliferation of Subependymal Cells in the Adult Primate CNS: Differential Uptake of DNA Labeled Precursors," Journal fur Hirnforshcung, 24: 23–33, 1983. *Kaplan, MS, "Neurogenesis in the Three Month Old Rat Visual Cortex," Journal of Comparative Neurology, 195: 323–338, 1981. *Graziadei, PP & MS Kaplan, "Regrowth of Olfactory Sensory Axons into Transplanted Neural Tissue," Brain Research, 201: 39–44, 1980. *Kaplan, MS & JW Hinds, "Gliogenesis of Astrocytes and Oligodendrocytes in the Adult Neocortical Grey and White Matter of the Rat: Electron Microscopic Analysis of Light Radioautographs," Journal of Comparative Neurology, 193: 711–727, 1980. *Kaplan, MS, "Proliferation of Epithelial Cells in the Adult Primate Choroid Plexus," Anatomical Record, 197: 495–502, 1980. *Kaplan, MS, "Cell Proliferation in the Adult Mammalian Brain," Thesis, May 1979. *Kaplan, MS & JW Hinds, "Neurogenesis in the Adult Rat: Electron Microscopic Analysis of Light Radioautographs," Science, 197: 1092–1094, 1977.


References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Kaplan, Michael 1952 births Living people Jewish American scientists Writers from Miami Tulane University alumni Boston University alumni Leonard M. Miller School of Medicine alumni 21st-century American Jews