Cochlear Implant :: Inventor of Cochlear implant
wins Germany's top neuroscience award
University of Melbourne scientist
Professor Graeme Clark has received the 2007 Klaus
Joachim Zulch prize for his research into neuroscience
and the Cochlear implant, giving hearing to deaf people.
Professor Clark was awarded the prize
for outstanding achievements in basic neurological
research for developing the multi-channel Cochlear
implant (Bionic
Ear). He shares the prize with Dr John Donoghue who
leads the brain science program at Brown University in
the US.
The Zulch prize is Germany’s highest
award in neuroscience, and is made by the
Max Planck Institute which is ranked by the Times
Education Supplement in 2006 as the top research
institute in the world.
Over 80, 000 people in more than 70
countries around the world now use Cochlear implants to
hear.
Professor Clark’s research in the Cochlear implant
was first undertaken at the University of Sydney from
1967-1970, and then it flourished at the University of
Melbourne when Clarke was appointed as Foundation
Professor of ear, nose and throat surgery in 1970 till
he retired from this position in 2004.
His research also received considerable
support from the Bionic Ear Institute which Clark
founded in the late 1980s and continued until his
retirement in 2006.
The Cochlear implant would not have
achieved such success if it were not for the excellent
industrial development by the Australian firm
Cochlear Limited and the crucial work at the Eye and
Ear Hospital in Melbourne.
Professor Clark will be awarded the
prize at a ceremony in Cologne in August 2007.
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